Another million mined bitcoins. What does this mean for the crypto economy?

Limited bitcoin emissions will soon become less and more limited.
If there is no unpredictable event, then the 17 millionth bitcoin will be mined in the following period, as shown on blockchain.info. It is a tremendous event for the coin. That's because, according to the current bitcoin rules, only 21 million coins can be created in total.
It is the first million-dollar terminal that we reach since 2016. It is important to say this, because it reminds us of an important technological achievement - the digital rarity created and supervised by a distribution program.

In short, the BitCoin code, since then cloned by hundreds of other cryptomonas, ensures that only a fixed number of bitcoins are introduced into the economy at predetermined intervals. Miners, or those who operate the hardware needed to track the set of bitcoin transactions, are paid with these data each time they add a new entry to the official register.

But there are many variables.

We can not accurately predict when the 17-millionth bitcoin will be mined, or who's going to lie. We have variations every minute. That being said, it is relatively predictable. Each Bitcoin block produces 12.5 new bitcoons. Bitcoin blocks are generated every 10 minutes, so about 1800 bitcoins are created every day.

So it is perhaps best to see this event as a "psychological barrier", says Tetras Capital founder Alex Sunnarborg.

For example, Sunnarborg sought to point out that another way to interpret the results is that 80% of all the bithocks that will ever be created have already been removed. In other words, only one fifth of total bithokin emission remains for miners and prospective buyers.

Others see this terminal as one that celebrates its technology and achievements.

"I think it's great," said Tim Draper, the investor who bought bit-dollars worth millions of dollars at an auction organized by the US government in 2014.

"I bet the founders have not imagined how important the Bitcoin will become or have dreamed of," he added.

Bitcoin emission limited

Others suggested that the terminal should be considered as an education opportunity - how the bitcoin works and how crypto generally work.

For example, if you do not decide to swap everyone who is running bitchin software on the computer (unlikely scenario today), you can not get new bitcoin on the market. It is a technological reality and has played a key role in combining bitcoin with money, economy and other rare natural assets.

Those who collect gold and who have entered the bitcoin market early because they understand the value of functionality have created cryptocurrency.

Trace Mayer, one of the most vocal members of the group, summarized in a Twitter message all the philosophy. He says governments might be looking to prevent users from holding bitcoins in the future.

"When you raise money, it means you confiscate it by inflation, which is a form of toll-free taxation due to law processes," he wrote.

Even the way bitchers appear in the market, called "minarets", is a reference to the analogy with gold.

Rather than be issued by a central bank, the bitcoin is created by a network by blockchain maintenance. When a miner finds a hash for recent transactions, solving the puzzle proposed by the bitcoin protocol, he is rewarded with a coin-based transaction, that is, new bitcoins credited to his account.

Several chips are created and these are deducted from the final broadcast.

Bitcoin emitting curve

The way participants are rewarded has changed over time.

When founder Satoshi Nakamoto mined the first Bitcoin block on January 3, 2009, he created the first 50 bitcoins. This reward remained stable until 209,999 blocks were licked when the first half or rebate reduction took place.

There was no surprise. For each 210,000 blocks, according to a predefined schedule, the network reduces the block reward by 50%. After the most recent half-life, in July 2016, the reward became 12.5 bitcoins.

That means that while there are only 4 million unfinished bitcoins, the network will not get the bitter total emission too soon, and in any case not in 9 years, as it took us to get here. As the half-lives are halving, the monetary inflation rate - the increase in emissions - is decreasing.

BashCo, a pseudo-anonymous moderator of the bitcontin subredit, drew the trajectory of the total bitcoin emission (blue curve) compared to the monetary inflation rate (the orange line).

Assuming that the bitcoin protocol remains the same (new minted block on average every ten minutes and the half-life and emission program

The next 120 years

With this in mind, the graph gives clues about another conversation that appears quite frequently - the bitcoin is scheduled to run for a long time now.

Jameson Lopp, Infrastructure Engineer at the House Wallets provider, reminds that bitcoins are divisible. So the smallest parts of each bitcoin can be of great value.

"Although 17 million bitchers sound a lot, it's an incredibly small amount. It is not enough for every millionaire of today to own a bitcoin. Fortunately, each bitcoin is divisible into 100 million satoshi, so they are enough for everyone. "

But there are all sorts of strange things in the program. For starters, the bitcoin will not reach 21 million units, partly for mathematical reasons. Miners do not always take the whole reward. On May 17, 2011, for example, someone received a reward of 49.99999999 per block, instead of a round of 50.

Moreover, to make this clear, Bitcoin does not retire when he reaches 21 million. At that point, the idea is that miners will be offset by commissions, which they already collect. Some researchers have sought to design how this market would work in practice.

There are many unanswered questions. But the event reminds us how far the bitcoin has arrived and how much more it has to go.

In the words of developer Adam Back:

"Another million. We have four more. "