Your opinions needed. How sustainable is BTC mining longterm?

[TERA]

This algorithm only ensures short run profitably vs electricity. It does not ensure anyone gets an ROI on their equipment in the long run, especially not you. To make matters worse, some people even have free electricity.

The algorithm ensures that someone somewhere is always going to be trying to drain every last mbit to cut their equipment losses as small as possible.

It's designed to support the network, not you.

[Bought]

I'm writing a paper on bitcoin mining (and cloud hashing services), and I'm wondering what your opinions are on its sustainability longterm considering different factors like increasing electricity costs (it has been going up in fiat value), price volatility (especially at times of low prices), competition (miners out doing other miners hashing power) and the halving of miners' reward

Do you think it will be sustainable for decades to come?

I don't think the electricity and hardware costs will keep up with the rewards for the miners. That's a bit of a worry.

[tokeweed]

From what I gather, most people think BTC mining is not sustainable in the very longterm.  I'm thinking satoshi might have missed the possibility of ASICS and the cartelization of mining.  That said, are the miners of today still making profit at a 25 BTC block reward?  If they are, would they still be after the halving next year (assuming the BTC price still stays the same)?

[Amph]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

[tokeweed]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

They profit for sure.  But remember they invested significant capital upfront to start mining BTC.  So how much do they need in terms of block rewards until they get their investment back at current prices?

[Ibian]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

They profit for sure.  But remember they invested significant capital upfront to start mining BTC.  So how much do they need in terms of block rewards until they get their investment back at current prices?

It's not profit until they roi.

[tokeweed]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

They profit for sure.  But remember they invested significant capital upfront to start mining BTC.  So how much do they need in terms of block rewards until they get their investment back at current prices?

It's not profit until they roi.

Exactly.  Which begs the question how much in block rewards will it take until they do get to ROI at the current price?

[kwukduck]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

They profit for sure.  But remember they invested significant capital upfront to start mining BTC.  So how much do they need in terms of block rewards until they get their investment back at current prices?

Did you mine or try to mine yourself? If so, you know it's not easy profit, it's risky and requires very large investments for very small profits. The only big profit to be made with mining is if you hold and the price will rise a lot, which is rather unlikely.

The miners that we still have left aren't mining for profit, they are dedicated to a cause, they are people who were around with bitcoin when it all started,  for an idea!

[LMGTFY]

Did you mine or try to mine yourself? If so, you know it's not easy profit, it's risky and requires very large investments for very small profits. The only big profit to be made with mining is if you hold and the price will rise a lot, which is rather unlikely.

The miners that we still have left aren't mining for profit, they are dedicated to a cause, they are people who were around with bitcoin when it all started,  for an idea!

I'm fairly certain the large Chinese mining operations weren't around when I was mining, back in 2010-2011. I don't recall Chinese miners being a significant factor until 2012-2013. Maybe they were solo mining like the rest of us, in Slush's pool. They certainly weren't large enough to register on the mining pools radar.

Incidentally, any response to my "skyrocket" question?

[Amph]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

They profit for sure.  But remember they invested significant capital upfront to start mining BTC.  So how much do they need in terms of block rewards until they get their investment back at current prices?

i think the majority already roied on their old equipments, they are there since many years already

a random chinese farm with 100 peta spent something like, what...100k btc?(5 btc 1 antminer s7 x 20k s7(100peta/5tera)), but they can produce 500 btc daily x 365 = 180k btc...

this mean that any farm running s7 can pay their equipment in 6 months, and then every new added asic can be payed in no time, they only need to face the electricity bills at present

this electricity bills is ridiculous low, because the ratio between the earning and consumption for 1 s7 is 8:1(8 in earning 1 in consumption), $360/$45(monthly) at 0.05 cent per hour

[tokeweed]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

They profit for sure.  But remember they invested significant capital upfront to start mining BTC.  So how much do they need in terms of block rewards until they get their investment back at current prices?

i think the majority already roied on their old equipments, they are there since many years already

a random chinese farm with 100 peta spent something like, what...100k btc?(5 btc 1 antminer s7 x 20k s7(100peta/5tera)), but they can produce 500 btc daily x 365 = 180k btc...

this mean that any farm running s7 can pay their equipment in 6 months, and then every new added asic can be payed in no time, they only need to face the electricity bills at present

this electricity bills is ridiculous low, because the ratio between the earning and consumption for 1 s7 is 8:1(8 in earning 1 in consumption), $360/$45(monthly) at 0.05 cent per hour

It would be nice to have solid numbers on this to complete my paper...

[Ibian]

the efficiency will help the profit for the miners, if the demand will not be there

miners need much less than the current price to have their profit, at 1k-2k in value they have their ass covered up to 2028-2032 halving

crazy value must come in play only when we approach the fee era, otherwise the mining scene will be fine

They profit for sure.  But remember they invested significant capital upfront to start mining BTC.  So how much do they need in terms of block rewards until they get their investment back at current prices?

i think the majority already roied on their old equipments, they are there since many years already

a random chinese farm with 100 peta spent something like, what...100k btc?(5 btc 1 antminer s7 x 20k s7(100peta/5tera)), but they can produce 500 btc daily x 365 = 180k btc...

this mean that any farm running s7 can pay their equipment in 6 months, and then every new added asic can be payed in no time, they only need to face the electricity bills at present

this electricity bills is ridiculous low, because the ratio between the earning and consumption for 1 s7 is 8:1(8 in earning 1 in consumption), $360/$45(monthly) at 0.05 cent per hour

Is this the current top end gear? Because that would still not be profitable in my country due to electricity prices.

[rebuilder]

What do you mean by "sustainable"?

If you mean "will economic incentives guarantee security for transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain", then the answer is... I don't know, but it seems likely.

Basically, a single party with malicious intent getting 51% or more of the hashrate is the scenario we need to avoid. So, economically speaking, potential gains from double-spend attacks need to be lower than the cost of gaining that much hashrate. As long as that is true, it doesn't matter what happens to miners.

Unless you want to get into attacks not motivated by direct profit... I don't know how to evaluate the risk/reward proposals there, though.

[Amph]

Is this the current top end gear? Because that would still not be profitable in my country due to electricity prices.

yeah, and if you don't factor the diff increase, it is profitable to run one even at 0.2 electricity

It would be nice to have solid numbers on this to complete my paper...

well it simple math, if one s7 can roi in 5-6 months, because it give you a net of $320 and cost 1500-1800

then any number of this beast can roi in the same time, no matter how big is the farm, well yes you need to take into account the cost of the psu

which would be $300 for each s7, then you can just add 1 month for the time that is needed to roi

[kwukduck]

Interesting to see all these 'expert' opinions missing out on very high maintenance costs...
You people certainly never did any mining of any significant scale....

[Amph]

Interesting to see all these 'expert' opinions missing out on very high maintenance costs...
You people certainly never did any mining of any significant scale....

maintenance cost can be done by some 2-3 guys, once in a months, i don't see a big problem with it, it would not increase the overall cost by much, probably peanuts

if you give $1k a month to one chinese guy, i'm sure he can clean you 1k machine in one day...

[tokeweed]

Interesting to see all these 'expert' opinions missing out on very high maintenance costs...
You people certainly never did any mining of any significant scale....

maintenance cost can be done by some 2-3 guys, once in a months, i don't see a big problem with it, it would not increase the overall cost by much, probably peanuts

if you give $1k a month to one chinese guy, i'm sure he can clean you 1k machine in one day...

Again.. It would be nice to have solid numbers on this.

[Amph]

Interesting to see all these 'expert' opinions missing out on very high maintenance costs...
You people certainly never did any mining of any significant scale....

maintenance cost can be done by some 2-3 guys, once in a months, i don't see a big problem with it, it would not increase the overall cost by much, probably peanuts

if you give $1k a month to one chinese guy, i'm sure he can clean you 1k machine in one day...

Again.. It would be nice to have solid numbers on this.

well i'm not working in a chinese farm  , there is one guy in the mining section, that is living in a farm, maybe he know the right numbers, but it will not be so far from what i've said

[HarryKPeters]

Mining beign and staying profitable on the long term is possible for the big guys.
The home miner should hope they eventually get their investment back.

The Asic manfacturers have no problem earning money these days, since their ROI is much earlier because they only pay 'production cost'

[gkv9]

It always depends on the price and rewards policy, the lower the rewards, the higher the price should be for the miners to be able to generate revenues/profits for running their equipment...