CointelegraphCointelegraph

Bitcoin Cash price hiccups amid second-ever halving event

Bitcoin Cash BCHUSD stumbled on Wednesday after a three-month-long rally before rebounding shortly after as the blockchain completed its second-ever halving — an event where mining rewards are slashed in half.

Bitcoin Cash is a proof-of-work blockchain network and cryptocurrency that was designed to be faster and cheaper to use than Bitcoin BTCUSD. The first Bitcoin Cash halving event took place on April 8, 2020, with miner rewards dropping from 12.5 BCH to 6.25 BCH.

There has been speculation in the lead-up to the halving, with the price of Bitcoin Cash increasing 147.85% over the past three months and 24% over the past 30 days.

However, in the day leading up to the halving, Bitcoin Cash's price dipped by 9.94%, falling to $572.21, as per CoinMarketCap data. However, after the halving, it quickly bounced back, reaching $604, a spike of approximately 5.5%.

The recent price decline led to liquidations totaling $3.9 million, predominantly affecting long positions at $3.3 million, while short positions accounted for $569,540, as per CoinGlass data.

Cointelegraph

On March 29, Cointelegraph reported that open interest (OI) in Bitcoin Cash futures perpetual contracts reached all-time highs of $708.75 million.

At the time of publication, the OI has continued its ascent, surging even further to $799.23 million.

Meanwhile, one X user "DavidShares" explained to his 17,500 followers that many miners had already switched over to mining Bitcoin ahead of the halving. 

He also noted that hash rates have declined since the halving. The network has now validated 840,004 blocks, indicating just four blocks have been validated since the halving event, as per Bitcoin Unlimited data.

Cointelegraph

In 2017, Bitcoin Cash forked off from Bitcoin due to a group of the community disagreeing over ways of scaling up and decreasing transaction fees to adjust for the growing demand.