diff --git a/test/test.util.js b/test/test.util.js
index b8c422d..22180ff 100644
--- a/test/test.util.js
+++ b/test/test.util.js
@@ -187,4 +187,17 @@ describe('util', function() {
       });
     });
   });
+  describe('#calcDifficulty', function() {
+    var bitsgenesis = 486604799;
+    it('should work for the bits from the genesis block; ' + bitsgenesis, function() {
+      var difficulty = coinUtil.calcDifficulty(bitsgenesis);
+      difficulty.should.equal(1);
+    });
+    var randomotherbits = 419476394;
+    it('should work for the bits in a randomly chosen block, eg [00000000000000001fef2bbc6da9b65e16f9187b7d88f15a308490bf2c9b8e1d] ' + randomotherbits, function() {
+      var difficulty = coinUtil.calcDifficulty(randomotherbits);
+      difficulty.should.equal(6119726089);
+    });
+  });
+
 });
diff --git a/util/util.js b/util/util.js
index eec49b2..f89dce8 100644
--- a/util/util.js
+++ b/util/util.js
@@ -510,4 +510,4 @@ exports.INT64_MAX = INT64_MAX;
 // makes 1 BTC
 exports.COIN = 100000000;
 
-exports.MAX_TARGET = new Buffer('00000000FFFF0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000', 'hex');
+var MAX_TARGET = exports.MAX_TARGET = new Buffer('00000000FFFF0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000', 'hex');