Bitcoin’s Big Halving Countdown And ‘Long Tail Risk’

On July 9, 2016, just eight days away, the bitcoin market is going to change.
As for the impact of that change, it’s all speculation for now, but just the chatter around bitcoin’s halving event has sent its prices fluctuating a bit more than normal. Of course, there’s Brexit, too, that pushed bitcoin’s prices even higher.
Bitcoin halving is an adjustment to bitcoin’s design in order to control how many new bitcoin can be created. When bitcoin was first released, a cap was placed on how many bitcoin could ever be produced.
When the halving occurs, the bitcoin block mining reward will decrease from 25 to 12.5 bitcoins. The last halving event was on Nov. 28, 2012, when the mining reward was cut from 50 to 25. That means that whenever a bitcoin miner completes a bitcoin block they earn a bitcoin. So when the halving occurs, the miners will only get 12.5 bitcoins instead of 25 bitcoins.
While it’s unknown what might happen after this halving goes into effect, many speculate that, if supply is cut, prices will jump. Basic supply and demand at best, and perhaps the oddest scenario. And just to get everyone on the same page, for this week’s bitcoin tracker we gathered up a few key numbers that might come in handy when this bitcoin halving event occurs next week.
15,717,057 | Number of bitcoins in circulation (As of June 30)

This post was published at Pymnts on July 1, 2016.