Paper proposes splitting Bitcoin block rewards to curb fee-era forks
Original title: Splitting for Stability: a Modified Reward Scheme for Transaction-Fee-Only Regimes
Analysis and simulation suggest an alpha split can suppress aggressive undercutting with less honest hash power than winner-take-all rewards.
A paper argues that as Bitcoin’s block subsidy falls, fee-only winner-take-all rewards can make undercutting and fork-based mining profitable and reduce throughput. It proposes giving the winning producer an alpha share of the block reward and distributing the rest to other miners. Analysis gives a local profitability condition for one-step Function-Fork deviations, and simulations find regions where honest mining dominates. Where forking wins, the learned strategy is the least aggressive variant studied, and the scheme does not appear to worsen selfish mining incentives.
Unconfirmed: Results come from analysis and simulation, not from deployment on Bitcoin.
- Winner-side reward, loser-side subsidy, and honest hash power set undercutting profitability.
- When forking dominates, the learned strategy is the least aggressive variant studied.
- The authors say the scheme does not appear to strengthen selfish mining incentives.
From the original article
1 min read at arxiv.orgAs Bitcoin's block subsidy declines over time, miner revenue will come to depend increasingly on transaction fees. In fee-dominated regimes, winner-take-all reward structures can create incentives for undercutting and fork-based mining strategies, leading to instability and reduced transaction throughput.
By Eric Brigham · arxiv.org
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