It costs $26,000 to mine one bitcoin in South Korea — and just $530 in Venezuela

[hakans]

I'm happy I don't live in south korea. What a huge difference.

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[butcherme]

I really think that the reason why it costs more in Korea, the cost of living in Korea is more expensive compared than in Venezuela. Thus, it's energy cost is also more expensive. That's why before planning on setting-up a mining rig, you should consider whether it will be profitable, is it worth it, how long will it take before hitting the ROI, and also the cost of energy in your country.

[flippener]

I find it hard to believe it's really so expensive to buy electricity in South Korea - if so, just buy some solar panels, that should be cheap (after all, many of them are made in South Korea).

[stompix]

A country needs a source of income whether it be raw materials, energy, labor, knowledge or in this case, block rewards.
Bitcoin could be a good turn of events for Venezuela, if they'd set up a state-run mining operation and fairly distribute the rewards to its citizens.
Better yet would be if Venezuela gave their citizens ASICs and let them keep the rewards.
How it probably will turn out: foreign Bitcoin miners strike a deal with the higher ups, cheap energy in return for a small part of the profit ending up in someone's pockets.

Oh , the socialist  dream crap in a nutshell.

The government should give the citizens ASICs, the government should give the citizens coins, the government should give!!!!!!
In Venezuela the government can't give milk for newborns or toilet paper and you want ASICs?

Venezuela is facing an energy crisis, food (whatever they still have) is rotting in broken fridges from every day power failures and you think about mining?

Yeah, energy is cheap, yeah gas is cheap.
But when your wage is 30$ a month, and you have to save for 20 years to buy a car most Europeans can afford in 6 months, what's the point?
You have cheap energy, but an S9 is 100 median wages!!!!

[maaydin]

the data is calculated due to electric costs I guess, but anyway people in South Korea wouldn`t need to mine btc because  if they do so they even won`t get their minimum wage worth coin.

[eaLiTy]

I am not sure how accurate these calculations are but one thing is certain that if you are planning to mine bitcoin ,you need to have cheap electricity as well as the money to invest in the hardware,if you are having cheap electricity then you might have the advantage and if Venezuela does have the cheapest electricity then they have the advantage ,but the point we have to understand is ,mining a bitcoin is not cheap compared to minting the same amount of dollars.

[darkangel11]

Time to go mine in Venezuela!

You wouldn't want to go there for any reason right now, and especially to mine!
http://reason.com/blog/2017/12/13/venezuela-bitcoin-cryptocurrency

The police is raiding people's homes to steal their miners and either mine themselves or to sell the miners on the black market. If you have a mine you can get robbed by poor people who struggle to survive, armed gangs, or the police themselves, who aren't better than the lowlife scum they were supposed to be protecting you from.

I'm happy I don't live in south korea. What a huge difference.

You should be happy you don't live in Venezuela!

[imteaz]

I think it's mainly due to Electricity cost as well as other cost associate with the mining. South Korea is not cheap, so that's why it is expensive. And south American is way cheaper than other western countries, and most probably electricity is very cheap also living cost, hence the price is very low.

[Patatas]

Venezuela is facing an energy crisis, food (whatever they still have) is rotting in broken fridges from every day power failures and you think about mining?

lol You don't have to be a Venezuelan to start a mining operation there.I don't want to sound rude but if you're coming from UK/US you might as well remotely handle a mining farm thereby providing employment for the locals.

Yeah, energy is cheap, yeah gas is cheap.
But when your wage is 30$ a month, and you have to save for 20 years to buy a car most Europeans can afford in 6 months, what's the point?
You have cheap energy, but an S9 is 100 median wages!!!!

Until and unless companies start outsourcing/giving out off-shore operations to them,there is a less chance the average wages will ever increase.But again those electricity charges will rise up eventually.

[John Langut]

A country needs a source of income whether it be raw materials, energy, labor, knowledge or in this case, block rewards.
Bitcoin could be a good turn of events for Venezuela, if they'd set up a state-run mining operation and fairly distribute the rewards to its citizens.
Better yet would be if Venezuela gave their citizens ASICs and let them keep the rewards.
How it probably will turn out: foreign Bitcoin miners strike a deal with the higher ups, cheap energy in return for a small part of the profit ending up in someone's pockets.

Oh , the socialist  dream crap in a nutshell.

The government should give the citizens ASICs, the government should give the citizens coins, the government should give!!!!!!
In Venezuela the government can't give milk for newborns or toilet paper and you want ASICs?

Venezuela is facing an energy crisis, food (whatever they still have) is rotting in broken fridges from every day power failures and you think about mining?

Yeah, energy is cheap, yeah gas is cheap.
But when your wage is 30$ a month, and you have to save for 20 years to buy a car most Europeans can afford in 6 months, what's the point?
You have cheap energy, but an S9 is 100 median wages!!!!

I'm not arguing for or against socialism. I'm saying since Venezuala has chosen the path of socialism the government should follow it through for better or worse. They're arresting individual Bitcoin miners who take more than their share of energy. By the same logic profits from state owned mining operations should be redistributed. It's the essence of socialism.

What's hurting Venezuela is the same thing that could be coming to California: years of drought. What kind of political system can fix that?

[stompix]

Venezuela is facing an energy crisis, food (whatever they still have) is rotting in broken fridges from every day power failures and you think about mining?

lol You don't have to be a Venezuelan to start a mining operation there.I don't want to sound rude but if you're coming from UK/US you might as well remotely handle a mining farm thereby providing employment for the locals.

I'm pretty sure that it will be a great opportunity for an american or for an European to "invest" in a mining facility in Venezuela.
After all, it's not like that country is known for nationalizing stuff that is owned by foreigners.
And of course there are no daylight robberies that remind me of mad max.
/sarcasm off 

What's hurting Venezuela is the same thing that could be coming to California: years of drought. What kind of political system can fix that?

Bro, that country is sitting on one of the largest oil reserve in the world,not talking about bauxite, gold, coal.
One of the best climate you can find, no need for heating in the winter, no need for snowplows.

That country has everything, agricultural land, rivers, lakes, beaches, mountains, a huge biodiversity... and yet...
Look at Japan, no oil, just rice growing on that rock, earthquakes, every year and...yet...

Drought? Saudi Arabia gets 50% of its water from desalinization.
Venezuela...imports gas!!!!!!!

Even if the Muppets would be running that country it couldn't get any worse than this.

[Bolt Brownie]

Are you sure about the $26,000 to mine one bitcoin in South Korea? I heard the average cost to mine bitcoin around the world is about $3k.

Electricity costs in south korea are expensive. They have a lot of demand from big businesses like Samsung, and the more demand the higher the electricity costs.

In places like Venezuela where there is not much industry, electricity is cheaper.

Well I understand that, but just costing around $531 seems to little since the average right now is at $3k, or something somewhere near that. I know Venezuela is in a huge crisis, and that the government is corrupt, but can you imagine how much money they would made if they invested in crypto mining? It just seems unreasonable that mining there just costs $500, when a bitcoin is priced at $10k. The profit would be huge, and I don't see big investments in BTC mining there.

[rehydrogenated]

This is ok info, but it is way to general. A lot of these countries are big places and you are using average energy costs. Some places, even in expensive countries, you can locate next to solar power. Since solar is very available during the day, and not so much at night, if you mine during the day it will be very cheap. In a lot of cases there is no way to store the energy because batteries are so expensive, so in some countries, like Germany you may end up paying almost nothing for energy during certain times.

[Roman Coinson]

I guess, this large difference between Venezuela and South Korea is a really big problem for Bitcoin price. It's not good for the market, it makes the opportunity to manipulations on the market.