Mining hardware manufacturer Bitmain has begun selling Cryptonight ASIC miners for next to nothing after the developers of the Monero cryptocurrency made good on their threat by launching a fork aimed at resisting ASIC mining.
Last week, Monero released an update that changed the consensus of the proof-of-work (PoW) algorithm. This update had one specific goal: to make sure that no ASIC miners would be compatible with the Monero network. The hard fork comes just weeks after Bitmain—the dominant ASIC manufacturer and the scorn of many in the crypto community—unveiled its new Antminer X3, the first Cryptonight ASIC miner.
At least one manufacturer - the lesser-known company Baikal Miners - announced that it had developed the Cryptonight ASIC a few days before the announcement of the more powerful Antminer X3 from Bitmain. Even though ASICs are much more efficient than GPU miners, they have one critical vulnerability - they cannot be reprogrammed. This means that fundamental changes to the PoW algorithm could render them permanently useless.
Although these devices are compatible with some coins, consumer demand for mining Sumokoin, Bytecoin and Electroneum is frankly low. Consequently, Bitmain and Baikal are now sitting on a huge pile of useless hardware. It should be noted that Bitmain, which made $4 billion in profits last year, will be able to withstand such a financial blow, while Baikal has likely bitten off more than it can chew. The Hong Kong-based company is now offering customers the opportunity to buy five miners for the price of one in an attempt to at least recoup production costs.
Meanwhile, at least five different projects say they will continue to work on developing the Monero blockchain.
Monero is not the only major cryptocurrency that has decided to use a hard fork to resist ASIC mining. Ethereum, the second largest digital currency by market capitalization, recently started this discussion immediately after Bitmain announced the development of Ethash ASIC miners. And although most members of the Ethereum community support the decision to fork, Buterin has not yet decided to take such a step.
According to https://www.ccn.com
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