Your example failed to show a table of orders received broken down by calendar day and by specific commodity...which is what I said I've never seen any company report...much less a private company.
Perhaps you are not used to reading 10-Qs. http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1362705/000119312513222640/d514192d10q.htmTop of page 21, you see the following products broken out: "Natural gas production (MMcf)", "Oil and liquids production (MBbl)", "Average daily production (Mcfe/d)" The example shows units per time. It was broken down by commodity, NGL liquids, oil, mmcf of NG, MMcf is a million cubic feet (a unit of volume to measure natural gas). MBbl is thousands of barrels of oil. Mcfe is thousand cubic feet equivalent and Mcfe/d is per day. You can see per quarter and variance between current and previous years. It also gives sales prices, hedges, and cost of producing the units. |
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Not even public companies do that, so why crow about it?
Yes they do. Especially commodities producers. Here is an example: http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1362705/000119312513222640/d514192d10q.htmRead any the 10-Q of most companies and you will see sales (they have to ship to be recognized as revenue) at least broken out by volume in dollars. They would be laughed out of the stock exchange if they reported they had shipped 8 day's worth of orders this quarter!! Then the SEC would sanction their auditors for allowing such nonsense. Now for a good question: given the evidence above, if you had 3 BTC to spend, would you place a new order for a BFL Jalapeño able to run at 7GH/s and 65W, or order 3 Asicminer Erupters for immediate delivery running at 1GH/s @ 12W?
Neither would be profitable. The Jalapeno is actually closer to break even, but carries a lot more risk given it's delivery date = (X * two weeks), where X is is a random positive integer.  |
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BFL is reporting the pay-dates they've already shipped by models several times/week. Today they reported shipping 10-calendar-days worth of Jalapeno orders in a single shipping day.
The problem with reporting shipping by "day's worth of orders" is we don't know how many units were paid for on that day. Could be 2. Could be 20. Could be 200. It gives us very little insight as to the rate at which BFL is able to ship units out. For whatever reason, BFL feels it should not reveal how many actual units are leaving the building each day. They claim they can do 300 units a day, but can't seem to make any progress past the first day of orders after 10 days of working on singles and mini-rigs. So did they build and ship 3000 singles in 10 days? Did BFL just add 150 TH/s to the hash rate in the last 10 days? Who knows? The fact that they are shipping out sample chips to bulk chip purchasers in a timely fashion suggests that delays are due to issues with other parts and/or assembly and not due to delays in chip acquisition. Not that it's fair but I think BFL chip purchasers will have working clones before many of those who bought miners...
Shipping a couple of sample chips is very different than shipping a couple of thousand chips. It is very possible that BFL is running low on chips and the bulk of their customers (as measured by hash rate) will have to wait until they receive the next order (100 days lead time). |
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Nonsense. If 6GH/s rig would be profitable then buying 10x 6GH/s rig would be equally profitable or renting a small amount of commercial space and buying 1000x 6GH/s rigs. CPU and GPU rigs are constrained by the cludginess of trying to scale out. Rigs which communicate with a host over USB lack any such constraint.
Either way the network is going to grow to where it is barely break even for new hardware (including electrical cost) from there it is only going to grow if/when either the exchange rate rises or more efficient devices are produced.
If Avalon charged $1,000 for a 6GH/s unit, you wouldn't see 1,000 of them going out in one hit would you. You seem to be missing the point. In order to keep the BTC network balanced and growing at a sustainable rate, you don't release hardware that is orders of magnitude higher hash rate than what's currently available. There is nothing stopping BFL or Avalon building a 10TH/s unit right now that requires massive 3 phase power, but there is no need. You were not around back in January 2013, but Avalon was racing against a phantom horse named "BFL in Two Weeks". It wasn't until batch 3 that Avalon realized that BFL was not going to ship in two weeks, and then they raised the price of their units. |
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His point is that they could have made more money, both by charging more per GH and by having more customers as a result of a slower increase in difficulty scaring less people off. I'm not sure I totally agree with this point, would it even occur to many of the people who ended up buying 60 GH rigs to buy 10 smaller ones had they not had the option? With that said, there is clearly a good business in selling smaller units to users while they are profitable then selling progressively larger units to the same customers as difficulty climbs. Avalon made a huge mistake launching a 60GH/s rig straight up, too much of a leap from FPGA.
From a business point of view, Avalon selling $10 million + worth of chips isn't a bad thing. All they have to do is package those suckers up and ship em. Easy profit. They wouldn't have needed to buy 10 smaller Avalon could have just released TH/s at a slower daily rate and charged way more for it, so ther would have been less TH/ s competition for the miners. Everyone wins. Except the people who get their units later rather than sooner. Those people do not win, they pay the same price for hashing at higher difficulty. You were not around back in January 2013, but Avalon was racing against a phantom horse named "BFL in Two Weeks". It wasn't until batch 3 that Avalon realized that BFL was not going to ship in two weeks, and then they raised the price of their units. |
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His point is that they could have made more money, both by charging more per GH and by having more customers as a result of a slower increase in difficulty scaring less people off. I'm not sure I totally agree with this point, would it even occur to many of the people who ended up buying 60 GH rigs to buy 10 smaller ones had they not had the option? With that said, there is clearly a good business in selling smaller units to users while they are profitable then selling progressively larger units to the same customers as difficulty climbs.
Granted, their pricing has not been optimal. But, the rise in difficulty is not under Avalon's control. Avalon first priced their units as if BFL was going to deliver in "Two Weeks(TM)" and that turned out to be too cheap given BFL's delays. They then priced their 3rd batch a lot higher and now people are asking for refunds because they fear it won't mine enough BTC to recoup it's cost. This fear is driven by Avalon's delays, BFL & ASICMiner delivering, and Bitfury & KNCMiner making good progress. Avalon needed to sell their first batch of chips, and that batch had a minimum size. I don't think it really matters if they put 20 chips in a box or 200 chips in a box other than it is easier to ship 300 boxes than it is to ship 3000. Given they were trying to sell a fixed number of chips, the demand exceeded the supply so people would buy 1 66GH/s or 11 6GH/s devices. Also, it has since become clear that Avalon's core competency is in designing and producing chips, not devices. |
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Avalon made a huge mistake launching a 60GH/s rig straight up, too much of a leap from FPGA.
From a business point of view, Avalon selling $10 million + worth of chips isn't a bad thing. All they have to do is package those suckers up and ship em. Easy profit. |
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Ah, interesting. I see they've arrived in Russia. Glad I chose not to order from batch #3.
How many TH do you think we'll see from those chips by the end of August? I'm thinking 50TH max. Most will probably come online in Sept.
The amount of Avalon chips in the order was between 500K and 2.1M (the pictures of the stacks of boxes is open to interpretation). If each of those chips can do 280MH/s, then that order is between 140TH/s and 588TH/s. |
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If for example you got your 60gh single upgrade right now... ROI in under a week.
Singles cost 200 btc back then and now generate 1 btc per day. ROI is already at 6 months assuming no difficulty increases. But as we all know, there's lots of increases on the way. A single delivered now will never break even. nothing from bfl was ever priced in btc, it was always USD. You're making the mistake of attempting to hold bfl accountable for the price change in btc... Just to be the devil's advocate, what do you think BFL would have done should the value of BTC fallen by half instead of risen by ten times? It doesn't matter what the BTC exchange rate is when you buy mining equipment. It also does not matter whether the exchange rate rises or falls. You can calculate whether or not you should purchase for any given set of difficulty growth rates and starting rate. When you buy mining equipment you are making an investment in BTC. Buying ASIC mining equipment provides a variable amount of BTC. Buying the BTC from an exchange provides a fixed amount of BTC. If you get more BTC from mining than from buying BTC off an exchange, then mining might be a good investment. If you get more BTC from the exchange than from buying mining equipment, then mining would be a bad investment. BTC cannot have negative value, ergo (all other things being equal) more BTC is always better than less BTC. Nobody is holding BFL responsible for the exchange rate. BFL customers from June 2012 could not have predicted that their investment in BFL was inferior to purchasing BTC off an exchange because of the "Two More Weeks(TM)" marketing that went on. |
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If for example you got your 60gh single upgrade right now... ROI in under a week.
Singles cost 200 btc back then and now generate 1 btc per day. ROI is already at 6 months assuming no difficulty increases. But as we all know, there's lots of increases on the way. A single delivered now will never break even. people still using the 'if you held on to year old btc' arguments?? I made long posts exposing this fallacy. The fault is that people bet on BFL to deliver and they didn't, you can't go by the btc increase. Anything you bought with btc at that time looks dumb in hindsight. You could of spent 300 btc on weed and you would say.. omg how much smoke i would have if i waited a year... lol When the USBees came out, btc was around $120.. it is kinda the complete opposite situation. A device that can't really hash too well but you gained by spending your btc then instead of holding them.. still doesn't really make that a good purchase unless you just like having them... but then they changed the price so you lose that small positive that you had.. so future telling is a waste, you have to make the decision on what you know at the time and hedge if you are unsure In this situation you are deciding between buying a variable return of BTC (ASIC mining equipment) or a fixed return of BTC (buying bitcoin from an exchange). In both cases, the only thing you will receive for your investment is BTC. So you can completely ignore exchange rates. If you take X amount of BTC and invest it in something that only produces BTC and receive less than X BTC back, it was a bad investment. The USBees were never a good investment. They were priced in BTC and only produced BTC. At the original price of 2, it was highly unlikely that they would ever earn back that 2 BTC. BFL has been a bad investment for miners because no matter what the exchange rate is in the future, they would have been better off just buying/holding their BTC. |
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If for example you got your 60gh single upgrade right now... ROI in under a week. If it's in a month or 2 from now... maybe it takes 2 or 3 weeks. There's no reason after waiting this long to cancel any order imo... much less an upgrade order.
If you could order now and get a single, then nobody would be upset with BFL and this thread would not exist. And ROI for $2500 (~26 BTC) for a BFL Single ordered today, arriving today and mining at today's difficulty is a month, not a week. But that situation is impossible, since for an item ordered today to be delivered by BFL their entire back log would have to be delivered. That backlog would at least double and probably triple difficulty. So you are looking at 2 months and more likely 3 months (assuming zero growth in difficulty) for ROI to be positive on a single ordered and delivered today. In reality, the single would not be delivered until September (if Josh finally keeps a promise about when things ship) or more likely later in the fall or even winter. That means those 2 million Avalon chips that just arrived need to be added to the hash rate as well. That is another 550 TH/s which would bring difficulty to over 80 million. Then you have to hope that neither Bitfury nor KNC deliver. You have to hope that ASICMiner doesn't dump more mining power in as well. That is a pretty grim outlook. People who ordered from BFL last summer would have been better off just keeping their BTC instead of trying to mine for it with BFL equipment. There is no way they will earn all that BTC back.  |
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Dude... You and BFL may want us all to believe this but until a customers order physically ships it appears according to the FTC that the company must issue a prompt refund when the customer asks for a refund for ANY reason. Just because their ToS is against FTC regulations doesn't mean it's OK to break those regulations because you put it in your ToS LDO. (Bolded in mine) When You Must Cancel an Order You must cancel an order and provide a prompt refund when: •the customer exercises any option to cancel before you ship the merchandise; •the customer does not respond to your first notice of a definite revised shipment date of 30 days or less and you have not shipped the merchandise or received the customer’s consent to a further delay by the definite revised shipment date; •the customer does not respond to your notice of a definite revised shipment date of more than 30 days (or your notice that you are unable to provide a definite revised shipment date) and you have not shipped the merchandise within 30 days of the original shipment date; •the customer consents to a definite delay and you have not shipped or obtained the customer’s consent to any additional delay by the shipment time the customer consented to; •you have not shipped or provided the required delay or renewed option notices on time; or •you determine that you will never be able to ship the merchandise. http://business.ftc.gov/documents/bus02-business-guide-mail-and-telephone-order-merchandise-ruleThe way I read this BFL is clearly in violation of the FTC mail and telephone order merchandise rule (punishable by the FTC suing them for up to $16,000 per incident). Your turn, please post some evidence of BFL's no refund policy being legitimate. Reading comprehension is my friend... I'd be happy to introduce you if you'd like to meet up. Item 1: any option to cancel: There is no option for canceling in the sales contract, it specifically states non refundable. An Option refers to a provision in the contract allowing... etc. Incorrect. The customer cannot waive the rules of the FTC for BFL, nor can BFL make them disappear by claiming they do not have to follow them (e.g. "no cancellations and/or no refunds"). Customers retain their right to a refund from BFL under the "Dry testing" advisory opinion issued by the FTC about the "Mail or Telephone Order Merchandise Trade Regulation Rule". Item 2: concerns company initiated action - does not apply.
Except that company initiated action was required of BFL, which they failed to do. If you can't ship within the promised time (or within 30 days if you made no promise), you must notify the customer of the delay, provide a revised shipment date and explain his right to cancel and get a full and prompt refund.BFL missed their original promised date of October and has never issued a hard date since. "As soon as two more weeks" and "2 months or more" are not shipping dates. By law, you must have a reasonable basis for stating that a product can be shipped within a certain time. If your advertising doesn't clearly and prominently state the shipment period, you must have a reasonable basis for believing that you can ship within 30 days.Item 3: concerns company initiated action - does not apply.
Also incorrect. " definite revised shipment date" does not mean "later". It means a calendar day ("by July 18th") or a fixed time period ("within 3 days"). Since BFL never provided what they were required to provide, the customers were denied their opportunity to cancel their orders in response to it. Item 4: nobody consented to any sort of 'definite delay' - bfl ship time has always been "later"
Since BFL did not provide their revised schedule, nobody had the opportunity to consent to it. For definite delays of up to 30 days, you may treat the customer's silence as agreeing to the delay. But for longer or indefinite delays - and second and subsequent delays - you must get the customer's written, electronic or verbal consent to the delay. If the customer doesn't give you his okay, you must promptly refund all the money the customer paid you without being asked by the customer.BFL are the kings of the indefinite delay. Item 5: doesn't apply since no definite deliver date ever established.
That is a violation of FTC rules. By law, you must have a reasonable basis for stating that a product can be shipped within a certain time."Later" is the opposite of certain. My advice to you would be - stop trying to invoke the ftc - you obviously don't understand enough about contract law to have any hope of interpreting their regulations.
Oh the irony. Instead of looking up the rules yourself or going to one of the dozens of sites that explain them to you, you just waltz in wing it. So far PayPal has been granting refunds to BFL customers who want them, but the FTC is there if PayPal ever cuts off the flow of refunds. |
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BFL are not in the EU.
BFL's CEO Nasser Ghoseiri lives in France. That probably doesn't count for much though. Germany != EU != France. He is not their CEO. If not him, then who?  |
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You know you have to wait till your place in line comes up, no? And that you agreed to that, and at the pop-up which you had to click to maintain or cancel your order because changed power usage you chose "agree", like you agreed to the "no more refunds once we start delivering?" Something something you can't forbid refunds on pre-sale items something something law If this is actually happening, it should be trivial for the German judiciary to write a polite note to the US FTC and ask them to take some action on BFL. Since BFL violates FTC rules, there won't be issues about enforcement. |
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I love how Inaba is so devoid of any actual information about BFL that he literally has to make things up in every thread. The man has absolutely no integrity what so ever. He steals from bitcoindf.org for his own pocket. Lies about everything he touches. He is the very definition of a pathological liar. You can literally show him that he's incorrect and he'll still maintain that what he says is true.
Josh... you need meds or something man, you should seek help.
Boilerplate is neat stuff. |
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Another utter troll/smear thread.
BFL hides who is working for them (they don't give out last names or profiles), who is backing the company, what the qualifications of their team are, how many items have shipped, or when customers can expect their merchandise. This thread is not a troll/smear, it is just speculation. If BFL would take the time to actually put out professional PR, these sorts of speculative threads might not appear. On the other hand, they have lied so many times already it probably is too late to salvage their public relations. |
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Asicminer USB Erupters...how do they even make sense? Magnets. |
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Put your coffee cup on it. |
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Why would you ask on a forum? There are very strong incentives for for other miners to mislead you. Competing miners using different hardware will want you to waste money on Avalon, whereas Avalon miners will want you to refund (so they have less competition).
This is a question that can be answered with math for a range of difficulty growth rates. Of course, nobody can predict exactly what the growth rate will actually be. One can assign probability to the range and make a decent model of ROI for the various flavors of ASIC mining hardware. But your comments about conflict of interest are correct. |
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