Context:
Bitcoin blocks have a difficulty that adjusts every 2016 blocks. The halving is scheduled to take place once block 840,000 is mined. The difficulty is adjusted to keep the average time between blocks approximately 10 minutes.
Market resolution:
The market will resolve 2016 blocks after the difficulty adjustment takes place; i.e.
block 842,016. The market will resolve early once it is is mined.
If the diffculty of block 842,016 is less than the difficulty of block 840,000 this market will resolve to YES. If it is the same or higher than the market will resolve to NO.
1,000
3.00https://www.blockchain.com/explorer/blocks/btc/840000 had difficulty 86,388,558,925,171.02
https://www.blockchain.com/explorer/blocks/btc/842016 has higher difficulty at 88,104,191,118,793.16.
For more context this happened 2/3 times in the past. A YES bettor may expect that because the mining subsidy is smaller the miners will turn off their machines because they are not making enough profit after considering electricity.
Decreased in the first and third halving:
https://www.blockchain.com/explorer/blocks/btc/210000
https://www.blockchain.com/explorer/blocks/btc/212016
https://www.blockchain.com/explorer/blocks/btc/630000
https://www.blockchain.com/explorer/blocks/btc/632016
Increased in the second halving:
@bluefrog FYI, most of the period determining the difficulty for block 842016 will take place before the halving. You might want to compare block 844032.
@BoltonBailey oops. I feel stupid. I assumed the difficulty adjustment cycle was aligned with the halving cycle.
There's obviously not a lot of traders here, but it looks like the question is clearly written in terms of 2016 blocks after the halving.
I wonder if it is better to create a different market and let this one resolve as written?
@BoltonBailey Thanks for flagging this. Since this market seems consistently worded it will resolve as written.
I made a spin-off market here to ask about a few more difficulty adjustment cycles after the halving.
https://manifold.markets/bluefrog/will-bitcoin-difficulty-increase-in
Note the first answer in that market overlaps with this current question, but rephrased so YES = increase.