Recent research has revealed that the risk of a “51% attack” on Bitcoin (BTC) has been severely underestimated by the market.
An attacker might only need to spend about $6 billion to completely take down the Bitcoin network, according to new work by Duke University finance professor Campbell Harvey.
Harvey noted that both Bitcoin and gold are seen as “hedges against currency depreciation,” but Bitcoin faces much greater risks than gold.
According to the research, an attacker could seize control of the Bitcoin network within a week. This would require purchasing approximately $4.6 billion worth of hardware, spending $1.34 billion to build data centers, and incurring $130 million in weekly electricity costs. The attacker could also short Bitcoin in derivatives markets, generating massive profits from the price decline, potentially more than offsetting the attack costs.
However, some experts believe this scenario is overblown. Bitcoin USA President Matt Prusak argued that such an attack is nearly impossible to implement in practice, saying, “Accumulating and deploying mining hardware takes years. Furthermore, short transactions requiring large amounts of collateral are difficult, and exchanges may shut down transactions if they detect suspicious activity.”
*This is not investment advice.
