Bitcoin hashprice climbed to $39.63 per PH/s per day on 6 September 2026, a rise of 22 percent in thirty days. Network hashrate barely moved in the same period, holding around 934 EH/s. When mining gets meaningfully more profitable and the network does not grow, the constraint is not appetite. It is getting machines plugged in.
The numbers behind it
| Metric | Latest reading | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Hashprice | $39.63 / PH/s / day | +22.2% in 30 days (from $32.42) |
| Network difficulty | 127.45 T (block 965664) | +1.31%, eighth increase of 2026 |
| Network hashrate | ~934 EH/s | Broadly flat, still under 1 ZH/s |
| Transaction fees | 0.43% of miner reward | Revenue tied almost entirely to BTC price |
Two of those lines matter more than the rest. Difficulty rising only 1.31 percent on the back of a 22 percent margin improvement is unusual. In a normal cycle, better margins pull idle machines back online and pull forward new orders within weeks. That is not happening at scale right now.
Why isn’t hashrate following the money?
Part of it is caution. Fees are contributing almost nothing, which means this year’s profitability rides on the BTC price and operators know it. Nobody wants to sign a two year power contract on the back of a thirty day move.
The larger part is supply. Bitmain, MicroBT and Canaan together account for more than 95 percent of ASIC supply worldwide. When three vendors control effectively the whole market, anything that slows those three slows everybody, and the friction is currently concentrated in one place.
What is happening on the US side
Bitmain has been under a federal national security review in the United States, led by the Department of Homeland Security, examining whether mining hardware could be remotely controlled. Shipments have been held at US ports and units have been taken apart for chip and firmware inspection. Bitmain denies the capability and says it complies with US law. No sanction has been issued and no finding has been published.
Separately, tariff pressure has pushed all three major manufacturers to move assembly into the United States. That is a structural shift, not a temporary workaround, and it comes with the usual first-year cost of any new production line.
Both things point the same direction for a US buyer: longer and less predictable lead times, more paperwork, and a repair and spare parts chain that is harder to plan around. That is a planning problem before it is anything else.
Does any of this apply to buyers in Europe?
Not in the same way, and the difference is worth being precise about rather than overselling.
Hardware already in free circulation inside the EU moves between member states without customs clearance or import duty. A unit shipped from a Netherlands warehouse to a site in Sweden, Germany or Finland is an intra-EU delivery. It does not queue behind a US port inspection, because it never touches one. Repairs and warranty handling stay inside the same jurisdiction as the buyer.
What that is worth in practice:
- Lead time from our Netherlands warehouse: 2-4 days in EU zone and 5-7 days to outside EU zone
- Typical EU repair turnaround: 1-2 weeks
A note on nuance: this is not a claim that anyone is in trouble. Bitmain remains the manufacturer of the machines most European operations run, including ours. The point is narrower. Where the equipment sits when you order it changes how long you wait for it, and right now that is the variable doing the most work.
The machines actually shipping this cycle
Bitmain announced two units at the World Digital Mining Summit on 28 August 2026.
| Model | Hashrate | Power | Efficiency | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Antminer S23 XP Hyd. | 600 TH/s | 5,340 W | 8.9 J/TH | First flagship below 9 J/TH. Around $25.5/T. Shipping from November 2026 |
| Antminer S23e U2H | 865 TH/s | 8,650 W | 10 J/TH | 2U rack format, launched at a promotional $11/T for one month |
The S23 XP Hyd. is the first flagship to break below 9 J/TH, which changes the arithmetic on older air-cooled fleets at European power prices. The S23e U2H is the more telling launch though. A 2U rack chassis at 865 TH/s is a data centre product, not a mining shed product. Read alongside the summit’s focus on hydro cooling and heat recovery, the direction is clear enough: the industry is being rebuilt around rack density and reusable heat, and the sites being planned in Europe now will look more like colocation than like the halls of five years ago.
What we would do if we were planning capacity this quarter
Order against a delivery date, not a price. At current hashprice, four weeks of earlier uptime on a 600 TH/s unit is worth more than a few percent on the purchase price, and delivery dates are the thing moving.
Ask every supplier where the units physically are. “In stock” and “allocated from an incoming batch” are different products with the same price tag.
Check the repair path before you need it. Ask who does the board-level repair, in which country, and what the turnaround has actually been over the last six months rather than what the warranty document promises.
Do not model on 8.9 J/TH before November. The S23 XP Hyd. does not ship until then. If your site needs to be earning before winter, the decision is between what exists today and waiting, not between spec sheets.
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BTC Amsterdam 2026 is coming!
The Bitcoin community is coming together in Amsterdam once again!
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📅 BTC Amsterdam 5 and 6 November 2026
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Save the date and get ready for another unforgettable Bitcoin experience in Amsterdam.
See you in Amsterdam!
