The Halo asteroid belt was the first major resource to be exploited as humans expanded from Earth, and due to the technology and resources of the time was largely invaded by real, breathing humans rather than artificially intelligent drones. When the time came for the Kuiper belt to be exploited, new advances in fabrication and robotics resulted in the rollout of many automated factory ships, but the Halo never really got around to 'modernizing', preferring the 'human touch' of the mining dynasties.

Due to the large amount of infrastructure and crew required to maintain a reasonably effective asteroid mining system in the absence of expensive robotics, many of the original groups that colonized the Halo are now organized in extended dynasties, clans and families, representing a small but vigorous feudal society of their own in the depths of the asteroid belt. While they maintain a unified political front and deeply resent interference from the CSA or Terran State, prices for volatiles and metal will sometimes oscillate wildly in the grip of the latest feud to wrack the O'Neil cylinders and hab rings dotting the belt.