Bitcoin's mining difficulty has fallen 14% from its January peak, reaching 126.23 trillion after a recent 0.74% drop. This marks only the second time in the network's history that difficulty has fallen below its year-earlier level, a trend attributed to weak mining economics, plunging revenues, and the diversion of capital and operators towards artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC) infrastructure. Falling difficulty indicates less computing power is competing, reducing competition for remaining miners. Forward markets signal little relief for miner revenues through the end of 2026.