Ah I see, that totally makes sense.

Any idea how I do that within the post body? Or is that only possible in the signature?

@zocadas What do you mean by textlink?

Anyone have any experience with this website freebitcoin.in?

They give you 30 satoshi every hour, potentially more if you roll a high enough number. They let you play a game of hi or low to double it. Additionally for every roll you get tickets towards a lottery. Seems like easy BTC and something to do when you are bored.

Both of these forms of mining have a cost barrier. It just so happens that the cost barrier for cloud mining is lower, but you sacrifice some freedoms so to speak. Additionally mining using your own rig requires time, which some people may not have. Still no reason to completely shut down cloud mining as a whole.

I want to share, learn, and maybe even collaborate. Investors across every form of security, asset, etc utilize strategies to mitigate risk and maximize profit, is thats what Trevon James promotes then he is not alone. And I would definitely agree with that approach. This approach can be applied to cloud mining contracts. In an earlier post someone mentioned cloud mining contract exchanges, something I would like to participate in. This derivative would provide an opportunity for investors to mitigate cloud mining risk, by holding contracts of different length and coin, along with options for when they can be purchased or sold. 

This again assumes that the value of bitcoin does not exponentially increase at a high enough rate to cover the difficulty increase. During the past few months this has not been the case. Bitcoin's value has increased exponentially, as has the difficulty. Now the same increase will happen with other coins, the question is when. Both strategies, buying+holding and cloud mining offer the advantage of giving you a coin at a "reduced" value, however one is riskier than the other and can potentially offer higher gains.

I don't argue with you that cloud mining is risky and many companies are scams, what I do want to emphasize in this post that cloud mining contracts(not specifically BTC contracts), at least to some extent, should have a place in all cryptocurrency portfolios.

@error08 finally someone who isnt salty about cloud mining. As bitcoin value increases and as the community becomes wiser in regards to scams, more and more legitimate cloud mining operations will become popular. From my own, albeit limited experience, CCG Mining seems to be one of those.

That said if genesis ever releases more bitcoin mining contracts I'll be the first to jump on. I think its important to diversify your mining contracts in terms providers. Because no matter how legitimate a company is there is always a chance that it will make a few bad decisions and as a result their business will suffer.

Mining revenues depend on at least two factors, mining difficulty which you are right does increase over time and bitcoin value. Since the beginning of 2017 bitcoin has been extremely bullish. Cloud mining revenues do not decrease exponentially, at least not in this market.

You make a good point. That said you are paying for a contract based on their terms, which on one hand can be viewed as giving away control of your bitcoin so to speak on the other it allows less experienced individuals to get some skin in the game by investing small amounts and seeing returns. Personally actually investing some of my money in services offered by CCG, has pushed me to read, learn, and research more about bitcoin and crypto currency in general.

So to broaden this topic, how can a newcomer utilize cloud mining contracts in order to build a small portfolio of coins and in turn learn more about this market? And investing in currency/assets/tokens/services as a whole?

To echo what most posters have said Genesis is the most establish company in this industry. It all comes down to mining difficulty and bitcoin value. Additionally this site is sold out fairly frequently, which I think is a good indicator of legitimacy. There are other sites that provide similar service but have not been running for as long. For example CCG Mining is one that I use. They have similar pricing to Genesis and also provide mining rigs if you are interested in mining at home, again the profitability of this depends on how cheap your electricity is.

So far I have been nothing short of honest about my experience. CCG really has provided good service. But only time will tell If it happens that I lose my money for any reason I will make sure this forum is aware of it. I just want to learn and share my experience/thoughts/opinions.

@monkeydominicorobin you make a good point, I should study mining on my machine, although I would have to buy a serious rig, my laptop is pretty weak lol. I'm curious, what is you opinion of renting/leasing a rig? I have seen many sites that offer this as a service, CCG definitely does.

In regards to cloud mining sites holding your money, does the customer service not assist you? Or am I being naive, so far my experience with customer service on the sites that I have used, mainly CCG, has been very good.

@HeRetiK If 5% in a couple weeks is too low, what would be an acceptable ROI from a mining contract?

Thank you for the info, those charts are helpful

I wanted to get some opinions on how changes in mining difficulty affect the value of bitcoin and other altcoins? Is it a proportional relationship or is it much more complicated than that? Thought?

I would suggest being cautious and doing research on both the cloud mining service that you want to use and the most "protected" method for paying for the service. Buyer protection offered by Paypal can cover discontinued service such as a scam or a legitimate company that can no longer mine for you. I started cloud mining a few weeks ago with CCG. I started with small amounts, I have reinvested and have made back about 5% thus far. I am really worried about the mining difficulty going up in turn I would receive less BTC per day. That said the value of bitcoin is only going to go up so I am confident that I will at least make my investment back.

If you are interesting in getting started message me, I can get you a few percent off of your first contract purchase from CCG Mining (https://ccgmining.com/aff.php?aff=121). Definitely start with a smaller contract for example $26 for 200GH/s. Other than BTC they offer mining contracts for several altcoins. Additionally they also sell/rent mining rigs if you happen to have a cheap source of electricity where you live. 

No genuine cloud mining site will give you hashrate or hardware for free, some however do let you pay for your hashrate with earnings. Most will cover the maintenance fee in this way which is nice.

@Rifat0099 I would suggest being cautious and doing research on both the cloud mining service that you want to use and the most "protected" method for paying for the service. Buyer protection offered by Paypal can cover discontinued service such as a scam or a legitimate company that can no longer mine for you. I started cloud mining a few weeks ago with CCG. I started with small amounts, I have reinvested and have made back about 5% thus far. I am really worried about the mining difficulty going up in turn I would receive less BTC per day. That said the value of bitcoin is only going to go up so I am confident that I will at least make my investment back.

If you are interesting in getting started message me, I can get you a few percent off of your first contract purchase from CCG Mining (https://ccgmining.com/aff.php?aff=121). Definitely start with a smaller contract for example $26 for 200GH/s. Other than BTC they offer mining contracts for several altcoins. Additionally they also sell/rent mining rigs if you happen to have a cheap source of electricity where you live. 

But you aren't actually giving them away, you do receive a service. If you pay for this service with something like Paypal, you will receive purchase protection. If your service gets cut by the cloud mining company and in turn you lose your investment then there is some protection there. It all comes down to how you pay for the service.

Time will only tell, personally I have had some luck with CCG. I have made close to 5% of my investment back in the last couple weeks. If the mining difficulty doesnt jump too high or the bitcoin value too low I should be in good shape.

@trecore4 Thats really unfortunate, I'm sorry that happened. You arent the first to have a negative experience while using hashflare. Genesis seems like the current "gold standard". On the other side I have seen some awful scams. That said I do think there are legitimate cloud mining companies out there. But you as the customer/investor need to do your due diligence purchase the services with some form of purchase protection, keep track of the current mining difficulty and bitcoin value, and lastly dont go all in, at least not into one currency.

 

CCG Mining does not offer guaranteed returns. They are transparent about the actual factors that affect the profit of a cloud mining contract (difficulty level, bitcoin value, and maintenance costs).

Additionally they have a few videos posted, one of which actually showcases their mining operation.

For those of you who haven't become salty as a result of lower than expected profits from cloud mining contracts, what is your investment strategy? Do you purchase all bitcoin contracts, reinvest your earnings, diversify? We all know that the difficulty of mining any coin is constantly increasing. In the face of that what strategies can you employ in order to hedge your bets?