The Bitcoin (BTC) network hashrate has decreased by 4% in the past 30 days, the sharpest decline in nearly 2 years.
At the same time, increased volatility and a declining price are causing rising stress among miners, as profits shrink. According to investment firm VanEck, this miner capitulation could indicate a market bottom.
Bitcoin mining power is declining due to price weakness and Chinese shutdowns on the network.
In VanEck's Bitcoin ChainCheck report from mid-December 2025, it states that the 4% decline in network hashing power was the largest since April 2024. This decrease occurred in a difficult month for Bitcoin, during which the price dropped by about 9%.
Volatility also increased, causing the realized volatility over 30 days to rise above 45%. This is the highest level since April 2025.
“We usually expect the hashrate to decline during significant drops in the Bitcoin price,” wrote Matthew Sigel and Patrick Bush.
In addition to price pressure, the Bitcoin hashrate was also affected by developments in China. Last week, BeInCrypto reported that about 400,000 machines had to go offline in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.
The shutdown resulted in a loss of about 1.3 GW of capacity and had a significant impact on the network. The computing power in China decreased by approximately 100 exahashes per second within 24 hours.
“This is likely due to power being shifted to AI applications and may lead to 10% less hashing power in the Bitcoin network,” said the analysts.
Meanwhile, the revenues for miners have also worsened due to Bitcoin's price developments. According to VanEck, the break-even electricity price for a Bitmain S19 XP miner from 2022 dropped from $0.12 in December 2024 to $0.077 by mid-December 2025, a decrease of 36%. Sigel and Bush added:
“Although profitability for miners has been poor recently, many parties continue to mine during periods of poor results because they believe in the future of Bitcoin. To support the long-term hashrate of the Bitcoin network, we think up to 13 countries are mining with support from their central government.”
Historical data signals a bullish turn
Despite the recent decline, VanEck notes that a lower hashrate can be a “bullish contrarian signal.” Based on data since 2014, the report shows that future Bitcoin returns are often stronger when the network hashrate decreases.
The 90-day future BTC returns were positive about 65% of the time when the hashrate had decreased in the previous 30 days, compared to 54% during periods of increasing hashrate.
On average, the 180-day future return was slightly higher when the hashrate decreased, around 20.5%, compared to about 20.2% with an increasing hashrate. This pattern also holds true in the long term.
“On the 346 days since 2014 when the 90-day hashrate growth was negative, the 180-day future BTC returns were positive 77% of the time, with an average return of +72%. Outside these days, the 180-day BTC returns were positive about 61% of the time and averaged +48%,” revealed the analysts.
Technical patterns support bottom placement
Technically, market followers also point to potential bottom signals. Market analysts, including Ted Pillows, have signaled a bullish divergence for Bitcoin on the 3-day chart, a pattern that also emerged the last two times at market bottoms.
“BTC 3-day bullish divergence is now confirmed. The last 2 times this occurred, Bitcoin formed a bottom,” said Pillows.
Whether Bitcoin will move back up quickly is uncertain. For now, the largest cryptocurrency remains under pressure. BeInCrypto Market data showed that Bitcoin was trading at $88,066 at the time of writing, a decrease of 1.01% in the past 24 hours.
