ASICMiner Shares A Good Buy?

[mgio]

Right now ASICMiner shares are at about 1.30 bitcoins per share on bitfunder.

Here are the pros and cons as I see it.

Pros:

Last week they returned a 0.0073 bitcoin per share dividend.

On an annual basis that is a 29.1% return.

This is 10 times better than most blue chip stocks that return dividends:

IBM returns ~2% per share, Costco returns about 3%. Pepsico pays 2.7%.

Assuming everything stays the same, you'll make back your investment in about 3 1/2 years from dividends alone.

ASICMiner claims to be adding (or adding up to?) 50 terahashes/sec in the coming month(s). They've already shown they have working ASIC miners as they are currently mining at about 8-10 thashes/sec (not sure of this number).

They've also been show to be trustworthy and claim to reinvest 50% of their profits in more mining hardware.

Given that Avalon and BFL have both been experiencing delays and neither has given any word as to when they'll actually ship (it could be weeks, months... who knows?) ASICMiner shares  seem to be a good hedge on these other companies falling through. Dividends should definitely be increasing in the coming weeks or even months.

Finally, for many of us who are invested in bitcoin to buy and hold, it is a good way to have your bitcoins make money for you without actually spending them.

Cons:

It can't last forever.

Eventually Avalon will ship and it is most likely BFL will ship too. When BFL ships their 60,00 plus orders and Avalon their 500,000 (?) chips, difficulty will go through the roof, into the hundreds of millions, likely approaching a billion. ASICMiner's percentage share will drop as likely will their dividend even as they continue to put more money into mining hardware. As this happens, the price of their shares will drop too, likely below what they are now, especially if more ASIC mining companies decide to get in on the game.

The big question is when will this happen, and can ASICMiner keep enough of a market share to justify their share price. If they can keep even a small fraction of the dividen they have going now, I would say yes. Even a 10% dividend return would be great. But if the market gets flooded with ASICs and miners are back to making just above their electricity costs, I'd say it's not a good risk.


What do other people out there think?

[GodHatesFigs]

They're too opaque for me: no one can be sure how much they're mining, or what they're doing with their capital. You have to take them on their word. I'd need some sort of independent audit before I invested.

[Franktank]

FYI: This week's dividends were 0.011085/share. It's going up from here. No one is going to tell you to buy ASICMiner shares but I will leave this here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=99497.msg1767379#msg1767379

[Franktank]

They're too opaque for me: no one can be sure how much they're mining, or what they're doing with their capital. You have to take them on their word. I'd need some sort of independent audit before I invested.

You must not read friedcat's weekly updates, check the auction or mining hardware sub forums.

[mgio]

FYI: This week's dividends were 0.011085/share. It's going up from here. No one is going to tell you to buy ASICMiner shares but I will leave this here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=99497.msg1767379#msg1767379

Where did you find out about this weeks dividend already?

[Franktank]

FYI: This week's dividends were 0.011085/share. It's going up from here. No one is going to tell you to buy ASICMiner shares but I will leave this here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=99497.msg1767379#msg1767379

Where did you find out about this weeks dividend already?

Here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=99497.4640

Sheets/graphs here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0AkPdXsQFT-vIdHRVUjQ5Ql9BQWR6OENLMkhyUktUblE#gid=0

Mining Users:

BTC Guild (User 67117): https://www.btcguild.com/index.php?page=rankings

BitMinter (realasicminer): http://bitminter.com/livestats/big


ASICMiner Wallet Here: https://blockchain.info/address/1HtUGfbDcMzTeHWx2Dbgnhc6kYnj1Hp24i

Anything Else?

[mgio]

One thing I don't understand is that on bitfunder it says there are 400,000 shares total but roughly 19,000 shares issued.

Are the rest of the shares (not issued) held by the owners (or "real" shareholders, i.e. not passthrough shares)? Or do they not exist yet.

In other words, if more shares are issued won't that decrease the dividend per share?

What causes them to issue more shares? How do I know they won't simply issue more shares and sell them diluting the value of the shares I hold and causing the dividend to decrease.

I need to understand more about how bitfunder works, I guess, but I can't find this information anywhere.

[mgio]

Wow, thanks Franktank.

I actually bought 25 shares yesterday and likely will buy more now.

[Franktank]

BitFunder is just one of 3 exchanges that hold AM shares (BTCT & Havelock). Many actually just hold contracts with friedcat, who sends divs every Wed. You would need to check the link in my sig for share specifics.

[Franktank]

One last bit: here's the most recent official update - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=99497.msg2013118#msg2013118

There's another tomorrow on the main thread

Best of luck

[GodHatesFigs]

They're too opaque for me: no one can be sure how much they're mining, or what they're doing with their capital. You have to take them on their word. I'd need some sort of independent audit before I invested.

You must not read friedcat's weekly updates, check the auction or mining hardware sub forums.

Quite the contrary. I simply won't take the CEO for his word when it comes to my cash.

[miningusa]

I wouldn't count on it in the long term. For now... enjoy!