btt

[Deprived]

If you order now from BFL, isn't the estimated delivery like late summer?

I wouldn't trust any BLF estimate until something ship.  How many estimates have passed already?

That's really the problem and it makes it tough to seriously consider a BFL order at this time. On the other hand due to the incredible rise in the exchange rate a single SC is a mere 20BTC, making it a more reasonable gamble. I think late summer for an order placed today is optimistic.

Problem with waiting is that if you place your order later then it definitely WON'T arrive earlier than an order placed now and it definitely won't cost less in BTC than an order placed now (BFL may not increase prices but they surely won't lower them).

So if you think BFL will deliver (even without any idea of when it will be) there's no real gain in delaying placing an order - and a definite risk of a big downside to it.  If you think there's a chance BFL won't deliver in any sort of reasonable time-period then, provided you can assign a percentage to that chance, you can actually calculate whether waiting is better or not.  If you believe there's a high chance they'll raise the price as soon as they prove they can ship then waiting ceases to be a feasible option - and the choice is between spending all on Avalons or ordering some BFL now (as if they'll raise the price once they prove they can ship then waiting gets you the biggest delay without the cost saving - and so only makes any sense if you're confident BTC will rise vs USD).

Assign percentages to the various uncertainties then do the math - then play with the percentage to see where the boundaries are.  Doing it quickly in my head I think you need to have in the order of 75% confidence BFL won't increase prices significantly once they've proved they can ship to make waiting worthwhile.  I don't see how you could be that confident - given a price rise would make sense for them AND for their very pissed-off customers with pre-orders in.

[creativex]

If you order now from BFL, isn't the estimated delivery like late summer?

I wouldn't trust any BLF estimate until something ship.  How many estimates have passed already?

That's really the problem and it makes it tough to seriously consider a BFL order at this time. On the other hand due to the incredible rise in the exchange rate a single SC is a mere 20BTC, making it a more reasonable gamble. I think late summer for an order placed today is optimistic.

Problem with waiting is that if you place your order later then it definitely WON'T arrive earlier than an order placed now and it definitely won't cost less in BTC than an order placed now (BFL may not increase prices but they surely won't lower them).

So if you think BFL will deliver (even without any idea of when it will be) there's no real gain in delaying placing an order - and a definite risk of a big downside to it.  If you think there's a chance BFL won't deliver in any sort of reasonable time-period then, provided you can assign a percentage to that chance, you can actually calculate whether waiting is better or not.  If you believe there's a high chance they'll raise the price as soon as they prove they can ship then waiting ceases to be a feasible option - and the choice is between spending all on Avalons or ordering some BFL now (as if they'll raise the price once they prove they can ship then waiting gets you the biggest delay without the cost saving - and so only makes any sense if you're confident BTC will rise vs USD).

Assign percentages to the various uncertainties then do the math - then play with the percentage to see where the boundaries are.  Doing it quickly in my head I think you need to have in the order of 75% confidence BFL won't increase prices significantly once they've proved they can ship to make waiting worthwhile.  I don't see how you could be that confident - given a price rise would make sense for them AND for their very pissed-off customers with pre-orders in.

Thanks as always for the analysis Deprived. As you probably know BTC difficulty has just re targeted to 6.695M. While this is just one of many increases since BFL announced their SC product line, this is a rather large increase and is caused in no small part by ASICMiner and Avalon both of which were originally scheduled to deploy after BFL's initial shipping date. I believe this further increases the risk of BFL becoming insolvent. I do tend to believe also that BTC will continue to rise vs fiat also making a BFL order paid in BTC less appealing at this time, but I haven't ruled out the possibility completely. Recent news releases from BFL have been anything but encouraging.

[creativex]

Due to the recent BTC difficulty increase and LTC difficulty decrease I'll be working on shifting our GPUs to mining the LTC blockchain as time allows today.

[creativex]

Sometimes you just have to put on your big boy pants and wade into the deep end of the pool. Tough to pay this much if you think in fiat terms, particularly as BTC was breaking through $74 just as I was clicking send, but I believe these are the guys that can deliver the goods.



Order process absolutely flawless. Kudos to team Avalon for patching it up. No surprise Bitpay could carry the load, they're consistently awesome.

 

[Carnth]

Sometimes you just have to put on your big boy pants and wade into the deep end of the pool. Tough to pay this much if you think in fiat terms, particularly as BTC was breaking through $74 just as I was clicking send, but I believe these are the guys that can deliver the goods.



Order process absolutely flawless. Kudos to team Avalon for patching it up. No surprise Bitpay could carry the load, they're consistently awesome.

I can't wait to get the ASICs mining. Diff is only going to get worse.
I'm glad bASIC-MINING is working to stay competitive.

[potato5491]

Sometimes you just have to put on your big boy pants and wade into the deep end of the pool.

Good executive decision IMO.  

[creativex]

I can't wait to get the ASICs mining. Diff is only going to get worse.
I'm glad bASIC-MINING is working to stay competitive.

The recent expansion plans announced by the ASICMiner team led me to conclude that we cannot afford to sit idly on a pile of BTC waiting for the ASIC picture to clear and remain competitive going forward.

Good executive decision IMO.  

Thanks! It's why I get the BIG bucks!

...now if you gentlemen will excuse me, I have to change.  

[creativex]

All GPUs are again mining BTC. I'll switch at least some of them back if there's another surge in the LTC/BTC exchange rate.

Update:

We spent some time submitting nothing but rejected shares earlier...looks like we lost about 30mins of work before I noticed the problem. The pool op over at bitparking is looking into the problem, which is apparently on his end. Meanwhile I've shifted the GPUs over to bitminter and I'll leave them there till I'm sure the coast is clear. Nasty problem as CGMiner doesn't switch to backup when shares are continuously rejected, so you just keep mining away without credit. I'll sell some alt coins to make up the lost revenue. Our dividends are looking pretty skimpy as it is while we await our Avalon orders.

[creativex]

As our daily yield continues to decline with each increase in difficulty without a corresponding increase in hashing power, I'm considering a motion that would change our daily dividend to a fixed yield rather than the 70% of mining revenue it is in the original contract(changed to 100% by shareholder vote) until our batch 2 Avalon arrives. The company has reserves of 424BTC so I think we'll remain well prepared for whatever scenarios unfold in the foreseeable future. Since the company was originally structured with a Dec/Jan BTCFPGA equipment delivery date timeline I think it's appropriate to return a portion of the funds raised to shareholders. So I propose the following:

Currently
Current IPO share  price = .37
Last daily dividend = 0.17026836
Last daily dividend APY = 7.8326235%

Proposed
Current IPO share  price = .37
Fixed daily dividend = .2174
Daily dividend APY = 10.0007562%

Then when we receive our first Avalon both this motion(should it pass) and the motion that increased dividends from 70% to 100% of mining revenue would be reversed and we'd return to the terms of the original contract.

Thoughts? This seems like a win win for shareholders, but I don't like surprises in my investments and I doubt I'm alone in this.


 

[demzie]

Throw in a motion 

[Carnth]

I don't like the idea of paying "fixed" dividends.

What is the reasoning behind offering more dividends at the expense of the treasury reserve?

If the idea is to sell more shares, then you would be paying dividends from the capital raised by selling these shares. You might as well just sell shares at a lower price.
If the idea is to create "investor value," then taking from the reserves to pay out more dividends now seems like robbing the opportunity to purchase more mining power in the future. To me, more mining power is more valuable.

I think dividends should only be disbursed with funds earned through mining.

[🏰 TradeFortress 🏰]

Yeah, don't pay dividends from the treasury (unless you're running BTCS&T).

Changing the dividends paid from 70% of mining revenue to 100% for now (until we get Avalons) might be a good idea.

[wachtwoord]

Yeah, don't pay dividends from the treasury (unless you're running BTCS&T).

Changing the dividends paid from 70% of mining revenue to 100% for now (until we get Avalons) might be a good idea.

Many large corporations do this, just not structurally.

[Carnth]

Changing the dividends paid from 70% of mining revenue to 100% for now (until we get Avalons) might be a good idea.

bASIC-MINING is already running in this mode.

[🏰 TradeFortress 🏰]

Changing the dividends paid from 70% of mining revenue to 100% for now (until we get Avalons) might be a good idea.

bASIC-MINING is already running in this mode.

Oh, it already is? Do you know when this started?

[Carnth]

Changing the dividends paid from 70% of mining revenue to 100% for now (until we get Avalons) might be a good idea.

bASIC-MINING is already running in this mode.

Oh, it already is? Do you know when this started?

Yes, it was the asset's first motion: passed on Jan 3, 2013

BASIC-MINING: Motion YES: 655 - NO: 0 - ABSTAIN: 0 - OUTSTANDING: 706 (655/706 = 92.8% Approval)
Title   Suspend Reinvestment Fund contributions.
Vote Between   2012-12-28 18:00:00 (CDT)  and  2013-01-03 18:00:00 (CDT) -- Polls are closed
Motion   
Motion to suspend the 30% Reinvestment Fund contributions and instead disperse
the funds as daily dividends to shareholders, until such time as the company's
pre-ordered bASIC01 mining unit arrives. At such a time the 30% Reinvestment
Fund would be reinstated as per bASIC-MINING's contract.

This motion can be addressed here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=130982.msg1423930#msg1423930

[🏰 TradeFortress 🏰]

Oh, I missed that! Thought bASIC-MINING was still directing a portion of the mining proceeds to growth / reinvestment.

bASIC-MINING isn't a large corporation, and the funds were held for future investment in mining hardware. Actually, I don't think this new proposed dividends would make much difference to the treasury, batch 2 should be shipping late April & the difference is quite small. A bit pointless IMO.

EDIT: And how is it "win win" exactly? It's not like they are free coins coming out of nowhere.

[creativex]

Thanks for the input fellas, you all make valid points. My thinking was simply that we already have ASICs on the way and still have ample reserves. There's just nothing to spend them on ATM that makes sense long term. I suggested a relatively small fixed dividend amount so as to stabilize our yield without significantly reducing our reserves...about .04BTC/day currently. Seems the concept is less popular than I'd have guessed.

[miTgiB]

Thanks for the input fellas, you all make valid points. My thinking was simply that we already have ASICs on the way and still have ample reserves. There's just nothing to spend them on ATM that makes sense long term. I suggested a relatively small fixed dividend amount so as to stabilize our yield without significantly reducing our reserves...about .04BTC/day currently. Seems the concept is less popular than I'd have guessed.

I also am fine with the decreasing dividend as I am aware of the upgrade path already.  If you were to find a great deal on a GPU or FPGA for now wouldn't be a terrible thing to use a small amount on, but it would have to be a screaming deal or in the GPU dept, something easily resellable.

[creativex]

Thanks for the input fellas, you all make valid points. My thinking was simply that we already have ASICs on the way and still have ample reserves. There's just nothing to spend them on ATM that makes sense long term. I suggested a relatively small fixed dividend amount so as to stabilize our yield without significantly reducing our reserves...about .04BTC/day currently. Seems the concept is less popular than I'd have guessed.

I also am fine with the decreasing dividend as I am aware of the upgrade path already.  If you were to find a great deal on a GPU or FPGA for now wouldn't be a terrible thing to use a small amount on, but it would have to be a screaming deal or in the GPU dept, something easily resellable.

I've considered that as well. With the large gain in the exchange rate GPUs are very much profitable again. We'd likely have little trouble seeing a positive ROI if we purchased a few 7950s that could be converted to LTC mining later. Frankly I'm not too keen on the idea of managing more GPUs at this point, but we could potentially sell some of our older less power efficient GPUs and replace them with more efficient better performing 7950s.

https://www.bitcoinstore.com/advancedsearch/result/?q=radeon+7950