Zero Sum Property

Bitcoin mining is a zero sum game. On average the chain grows by one block every 10 minutes, with the full reward controlled by its miner. Miners compete to achieve this reward and, apart from pooling pressures, will each on average achieve a number of rewards proportional to hash power. The difference between a miner's costs and this reward over time is the rate of return on capital invested in the mine.

There are two aspects of the zero sum property:

• During the time period between organizations one miner earns a reward and all other miners earn no reward. Neither price, hash rate, difficulty, inflation, fees, nor anything else has any effect on this property.

• The magnitude of rewards, in either coin units or exchange price, has no effect on the rate of return on capital.

However, return on capital does vary relative to other mines due to pooling.