Bitcoin Cash (BCH): 131 blocks instead of 144 in a day, here are the reasons

Bitcoin Cash has produced 131 blocks over the past 24 hours. The target is 144. The network is running about ten percent slower than intended, and as a holder you notice it in one place only: every deposit and withdrawal that waits for confirmations takes longer than usual.

The price does not explain it. Bitcoin Cash stands at $275.66 and has lost 0.76 percent over seven days, which is practically nothing. The cause lies in the computing power behind the network, and that has fallen this week. This piece sets out what has been measured, why it rights itself and which three places you can look at while it lasts.

Bitcoin Cash at $275.66: the week in numbers

Bitcoin Cash costs $275.66, as of Sunday, 3 a.m. Over seven days that is a loss of 0.76 percent, over 24 hours a loss of 0.55 percent. It is a quiet week, and it stands out because the month before it was anything but quiet: over 30 days Bitcoin Cash is up 17.1 percent.

The week ranged from $256.19 to $288.40. Between high and low there are 12.6 percent, on a weekly result of less than one percent. The coin has not run quietly, then; it has arrived where it started.

On market value Bitcoin Cash sits at $5.54 billion, which places it outside the 25 largest cryptocurrencies. Figures for the weekly change differ slightly by data provider, with the range between a loss of 0.76 and 1.03 percent; nothing is smoothed here.

131 blocks instead of 144: our count on the Bitcoin Cash blockchain

A block is the package in which transfers are bundled and finally written down. Bitcoin Cash aims at one block every ten minutes, so 144 over a full day. That number is not a preference of the developers but the target against which the network continuously readjusts its difficulty.

We counted 131 blocks in 24 hours. That is 91 percent of the target. The average block time therefore stands at 11.0 minutes instead of ten. A cross-check over the most recent 120 blocks arrives at 22.8 hours, which works out at 11.4 minutes per block. Both values sit above the target, and between them lies the range in which block time is currently moving: eleven to just under twelve minutes.

The basis is the public block data of the Bitcoin Cash blockchain. We checked the 131 blocks of the past 24 hours and the 120 blocks of the cross-check, plus the most recent block at height 973,335. This analysis was carried out by cryptoticker.io itself on October 18, 2026.

For a sense of scale: the block reward stands at 3.125 BCH per block, which converts to roughly $861. Thirteen blocks fewer in a day therefore mean a good $11,000 in total that was not paid out to miners that day.

2.99 exahash: the computing power behind the slower block time

The hash rate is the computing power that all miners together direct at the network. For Bitcoin Cash that figure currently stands at 2.99 exahash per second, so just under three quintillion attempts every second. When it falls, it takes longer for anyone to find a valid block, because the task stays equally hard for a while.

That is exactly what has happened here. The hash rate of Bitcoin Cash swung sharply this week, as the running curves at CoinWarz show. Such jumps are far more frequent at Bitcoin Cash than at Bitcoin, and there is a sober reason for it: both networks can be run with the same hardware.

Miners point their machines where they earn more per kilowatt hour spent. If that ratio shifts in favour of Bitcoin, computing power migrates away, and Bitcoin Cash is left with less of it for a few hours. Because the network carries only about one percent of Bitcoin's computing power, even small migrations show up clearly there.

Difficulty adjustment: how Bitcoin Cash retunes the ten-minute target

The difficulty adjustment is the rule by which a blockchain matches the hardness of its computing task to the computing power available. Bitcoin recalculates that difficulty every 2,016 blocks, so roughly every two weeks. Bitcoin Cash readjusts it after every single block.

That difference is the heart of the matter. Because Bitcoin Cash readjusts continuously, a block time that has grown too long corrects itself within hours: the difficulty falls and blocks come in faster again. The current difficulty stands at 458.5 billion. If computing power flows back, it rises just as quickly.

For investors that means eleven minutes per block is not a defect and not a sign of a damaged network, but the normal swing of a system that regulates itself. The figure holds only as long as the computing power is missing. To follow block times over several days, the series are available at BitInfoCharts.

Confirmations on deposits and withdrawals: eleven minutes per block shifts every transfer

A confirmation is a block that was found after your transfer. Every exchange sets out how many of them it wants to see before it releases your balance. At Bitcoin Cash, between one and six confirmations are usual, and some houses demand more.

Work it through and the difference becomes tangible. At ten minutes per block you wait one hour for six confirmations. At eleven minutes that becomes 66 minutes, at 11.4 minutes just under 69. A single deposit loses little by it. It becomes noticeable when a deadline sits behind it, such as a withdrawal before the end of a delisting window, or a transfer an exchange is meant to complete before a maintenance window.

What matters is the difference between two things that are easily confused: your transfer is not travelling more slowly, it reaches the network as fast as ever. Only the rhythm in which it is written down has been stretched.

How to check the confirmations on your BCH deposit

The first look goes to the transaction overview of your exchange or your wallet. The transaction ID sits there, a long string of characters, and next to it usually the number of confirmations so far. If it shows a zero, your transfer is in the network but not yet in a block.

The second look goes to the terms of the exchange. Every house publishes how many confirmations it requires for Bitcoin Cash; the number is in the help pages on deposits and differs considerably in places. Only that number together with the current block time tells you how long you are actually waiting.

Many overlook the third point: the fee you have set currently plays almost no role at Bitcoin Cash. The blocks are far from full, so your transfer makes it into the next block even with a low fee. A higher fee buys you no time here, because what is missing is not space but rhythm.

90.6 transactions per block: the blocks are far from their limit

Bitcoin Cash processed 11,872 transfers in 24 hours. Spread over 131 blocks that is 90.6 per block. The block size of Bitcoin Cash stands at 32 megabytes and therefore holds roughly tens of thousands of transfers. The most recent block was just under seven kilobytes.

Which brings the point that counts for you: the slowdown is a question of computing power, not of capacity. An overflowing network would show itself differently, namely in rising fees and a growing pile of unconfirmed transfers. Neither is visible here; the waiting pile last held 160 transfers.

Set against the lifetime of the network: 20,104,446 BCH are in circulation out of a maximum of 21 million. A good 95.7 percent is therefore allocated, and the rest arrives through the block reward over the coming decades. Every block that comes later stretches that plan a little.

Buying through a MiCA exchange: where BCH can be traded in Europe

Bitcoin Cash is among the coins that the European crypto regulation MiCA covers without special rules. There is no anonymity feature in the protocol that forces a trading venue in Europe to withdraw, as is the case with privacy coins. Anyone wanting to buy BCH in Germany will therefore find the coin at almost every licensed provider.

What counts in a provider is the licence itself. A platform serving customers in Germany has needed permission from an EU state since MiCA came fully into force; BaFin lists the German institutions in its register. Which houses hold that permission and what they charge for trading is set out in our comparison of crypto exchanges.

In trading itself, the depth of the order book counts alongside the fee. Bitcoin Cash turns over around $72 million a day, a fraction of Bitcoin's volume. On larger orders it is worth looking at the gap between buying and selling price, because in thin trading that gap quickly costs more than the order fee.

Holding period and custody: the difference between an exchange account and your own wallet

For tax purposes Bitcoin Cash counts in Germany as another asset. If you sell at a profit within a year of buying, that profit is taxable; after holding for more than a year it stays tax free. For short-term gains there is an exemption limit of €1,000 a year. If it is exceeded, the whole gain is taxable, not only the part above it.

The longer block time does not touch that period. What matters are the times of purchase and sale, not the moment a transfer was confirmed. Anyone moving holdings between accounts towards the end of the year should allow for the extra minutes and keep the transaction IDs, so that the allocation remains traceable later.

On custody you decide between two routes. If the coins sit in the exchange account, the provider holds the keys, and you depend on its withdrawal schedules, particularly in weeks like this one. If they sit in your own wallet, you hold the keys yourself and carry the responsibility for securing them.

Levels at $256.19 and $288.40: the range of the past week

To the upside the first level to watch is the weekly high of $288.40, behind it the round $300 mark that Bitcoin Cash did not reach this week. To the downside the weekly low sits at $256.19, below it the round $250 level.

Both are observation points from the range of the past seven days, not price targets and not a recommendation. How far the price sits from the start of the month can be read off the thirty-day gain of 17.1 percent: the coin comes out of a strong upward move and has this week neither continued nor given it up.

CME futures from October 19: next week's date

On October 19 the derivatives exchange CME Group starts its futures on Bitcoin Cash. It is the only dated event that acts directly on the coin in the coming week, and it falls on the day after this weekly review. What the launch brings in concrete terms, which contract sizes apply and which levels are in view, we set out in our piece on the CME launch.

A regulated futures market changes nothing about block time. It concerns the side on which prices form, not the technology beneath. For holders the date is of interest nonetheless, because futures open access to Bitcoin Cash for institutional addresses without custody of their own.

Bitcoin Cash blocks: at 131 a day every confirmation takes longer

The situation is manageable: the network is currently finding 131 blocks a day instead of 144, computing power stands at 2.99 exahash, and the readjustment of difficulty after every block pulls that shortfall back in without anyone's help. Three steps follow from it.

1. Look over open transfers. On every deposit or withdrawal in flight, look at the number of confirmations and your provider's requirement, and allow eleven to twelve minutes per confirmation where a deadline applies. Whether your provider is licensed in Europe at all you can see in our overview of regulated crypto exchanges.
2. Settle custody. Decide whether the holdings stay in the exchange account or move into a wallet of your own. The devices and their differences are in the hardware wallet comparison.
3. Document the holding period. Record the purchase date and the transaction ID while the data is at hand. Tools that keep that record running are in the comparison of tax software and portfolio trackers.

(As of October 18, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)