The most efficient bitcoin mining machines are selling for 77% less than last year.
Mining machines for sale
The best machines currently cost $24 for 100 TH/s according to the company Luxor. So an antminer S19 Pro that delivers 110 TH/sa can trade for around $2600.
These same machines cost over $100 for 100 TH/s last year…
CleanSpark has even just offered 3,843 Antminers S19 Pro for $5.9 million. That’s $15.50 for 100 TH/s! The miner Argo sold these machines so they could join Core Scientific early in the turmoil.
Here are the latest current prices for Whatsminers:
Great business. »
The COO of Luxor, a firm specializing in the sale of miningwhich reveals that there are only about thirty buyers in the entire northern hemisphere. “Almost everyone sells”he told the Wall Street Journal.
The situation has changed dramatically now that Antminer S19 Pro’s gross margin is only 38%, compared to 88% last year (assuming a price of six cents per kilowatt).
It’s really important for a miner to plan for the worst so they don’t get caught, whether on a small or large scale.
At time t, this margin is called the best estimate “hash price” . This metric shows a miner’s income for every TH/s they contribute to the Bitcoin network. It is expressed in dollars per day.
The hashprice, the compass miner
Several parameters are taken into account for the discount prices. The most important thing is undoubtedly the price of bitcoin which is difficult to predict. Its volatility, so extreme and unpredictable, has overtaken more than one miner.
The cost of electricity is another key factor that the miner has more control over. By the way, the discount prices which you will find here and there often assume that the kilowatt costs six cents.
It should therefore be a good strategy to settle near inexpensive sources of electricity. That is to say where there is a surplus of juice of renewable origin. Or on the methane flares, energy that can also be found for free!
Another relatively important parameter is the hash rate. It is a value derived from the rate at which miners manage to validate transaction blocks. It lets you know how many miners share the pie of the 900 BTC mined each day.
Hard to predict what exactly hashes miss if you don’t know the quantities produced by manufacturers like Bitmain…
We know, however, that there is a difficulty mining changes about 24 times a year and the average increase in difficulty over the last five years is 6% per month. That is 100% per year.
In other words, every year there are twice as many minors to share the same cake. A cake that is also cut in half every four years. The famous half.
The miner must also take into account the diminishing returns of his machines and their depreciation. Especially when more efficient models come on the market.
All this to say that it is a mistake to overflow with hope mining of bitcoin. You must always plan for the worst.
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Journalist reporting on the Bitcoin revolution. My papers deal with bitcoin through geopolitical, economic and libertarian prisms.
