Bitcoin exploded last week with an incredible 24% move, as Bitcoin mining difficulty rallied too. Bitcoin mining difficulty is a measure of how difficult it is to create the next block of transactions. This metric resets every two weeks and climbed by over 10% last week according to data from BTC.com – the largest rise since October.

Bitcoin mining difficulty fell 3.6% before the last update, after a winter storm led some miners to shut down. However, now miners appear to have come back online, with new and more efficient machines.

What does this tell us?

It shows how several Bitcoin mining companies have not lost conviction in the long-term outlook for Bitcoin, despite the bear market. In fact, Bitcoin miners like Marathon and Hive Blockchain have continuously deployed efficient machines. Marathon is one of the biggest Bitcoin mining companies, based in the US, who will be delighted to see progression of crypto presence at the government level.

The US has now created the first ever subcommittee on digital assets, which will be part of the House Financial Services Committee. Congressman French Hill, the digital asset subcommittee lead, said, “we want to create a regulatory legal framework for digital assets … that makes America a leader from an innovation point of view but also protects consumers and investors.” Despite a lack of constructive action so far from the US in response to crypto’s meteoric rise, this is a step in the right direction.