Bitcoins

[Azure]

The LTC pool I was mining at went from 300MH/s, to 800MH/s in two days. Insane.

Hopefully the difficulty doesn't go crazy before I get my hardware online. Stupid 3 day shipping.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by Azure

The LTC pool I was mining at went from 300MH/s, to 800MH/s in two days. Insane.

Hopefully the difficulty doesn't go crazy before I get my hardware online. Stupid 3 day shipping.

Litecoin profitability has already dropped like 25% in two weeks.

[Kelekin]

I get three days off next week (after working 51 straight) so I am excited to finally have the time to set up my GPU miner. It would've paid itself off already if I had had the time to set it up.

Since I'm quitting my one full time job to focus on my business, hopefully the combined setup will pay the bills. It's going to be interesting to see what happens as all the new machines come out in Jan/Feb.

[photon]

So if one was going to invest in the next round of machines, is it too late to pre-order? Like the 600GH/s / 350W one from Butterfly Labs seems great, but is it like H&L says and those that got it early will get a few months out of it and then by the time they ship in bulk the difficulty will have ramped up that getting it after everyone else won't be worth while.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by photon

So if one was going to invest in the next round of machines, is it too late to pre-order? Like the 600GH/s / 350W one from Butterfly Labs seems great, but is it like H&L says and those that got it early will get a few months out of it and then by the time they ship in bulk the difficulty will have ramped up that getting it after everyone else won't be worth while.

If you don't have any existing pre-orders (like Butterfly labs from August or something) which means you should get something in Jan/Feb, I think you should pre-order the next generation (Cointerra, KnC) and hope to get that. However, you probably wouldn't receive anything until mid 2014 as the first batches of those have already sold out.

[Hack&Lube]

I haven't read discussion on this anywhere so this is only my personal conjecture from experience. I'm currently predicting a large drop in the value of Litecoins over the next month and maybe even through Q1 2014.

Up until the last 2 weeks of November when Litecoin began it's climb past $40, there was a lot less mining than there will be in December. When BTC and LTC started to go up, a lot of the old GPU miners came out of the woodwork and all the new miners and layfolk jumped in because they smelled blood in the water.

All the effective mining cards sold out in vast quantities online over the last weekend. That means all these cards will probably be in place for mining after this weekend (assuming about a week for shipping and set up for most people).

Rapid difficulty adjustments from all these new miners getting in means a smaller piece of the pie that all these LTC miners made their projections on. The result will be a buyer's market where all the new miners are a little more desperate to sell LTC in Q1 2014. This will flood the market with cheap LTC and put a huge downward pressure on the price of LTC.

Us Bitcoin miners from 2 years ago saw this exact same thing happen. Bitcoin was sitting at around $25 when the pool of miners suddenly increased as everybody caught onto it and wanted to get into the game. Everybody was desperate to sell to recoup their costs or pay their bills and more and more miners were willing to take $20, $15, $10, etc. until the value of BTC was forced below $5 which lasted almost 1.5 years. Maybe mine alt-currencies and wait out the non-serious folk and then buy up their cards when they put them on the market for cheap as they try to get out.

I think my strategy right now is maybe to sell my LTC to prepay for some of my equipment and power costs and settle in for the next couple of months for a more long-term mining strategy.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

If you don't have any existing pre-orders (like Butterfly labs from August or something) which means you should get something in Jan/Feb, I think you should pre-order the next generation (Cointerra, KnC) and hope to get that. However, you probably wouldn't receive anything until mid 2014 as the first batches of those have already sold out.

Yeah Cointerra March batch says sold out, so April batch is the earliest available. KnC just says Q1/Q2.

What you say makes sense, need to get in on a generation early to make some money seems like. There's a 50GH/s miner on Kijiji for $2500, but even that wouldn't even break even in 3 months, and if the next round of miners that are 10X as efficient come out during that span seems like you'd never make your investment back.

[Azure]

Well I hope LTC value drops back to about $10 so the hashing rate drops because this is a bit ridiculous already.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by Azure

Well I hope LTC value drops back to about $10 so the hashing rate drops because this is a bit ridiculous already.

Unfortunately, I don't think the hashing rate will drop for a few months. All the people just that bought and built new rigs will be mining for scrap until they can pay off their hardware. Then when the non-dedicated folk decide to cash out and put their cards up for sale at discount pricing, the dedicated miners will buy them up

What's happening right now just smells like Fall 2011 to me.

[rubecube]

Bitcoins down to $830 after sitting at nearly $1100 a couple of weeks ago. Should I expect them to go up again? As in, is it worth buying more now.

[Miniac]

BTC at $650 and dropping. LTC at $28.

[Miniac]

Bitcoin prices began dropping rapidly Thursday following the People’s Bank of China’s announcement that it was barring the digital currency from all of China’s financial institutions. Individuals can still use Bitcoin, albeit at their own “risk.”

While Bitcoin was trading at a high of $1,240 prior to the statement, it quickly sank to a low of $870, a 30 percent drop.

Bitcoin’s price has always been volatile. In November, the currency made news when it reached what was then an all-time high of $305.

http://business.time.com/2013/12/05/...it-from-banks/

[Vulcan]

Here's a few 280Xs.

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.p...r&promoid=1382

[Kelekin]

Basically what's happened in a sell-off because people misinterpreted the messages coming out of China (as well as misinterpreting the tone). All they are saying is that the financial institutions won't have anything to do with them; which doesn't really matter, because it isn't a government backed currency in the first place.

That being said, this is like any market...and if I had money in hand right now, I would've been right there buying this bitcoins when it went sub-$700 this morning.

I honestly could see it sitting around $800ish through the holidays because people always need more money in December.

[nfotiu]

I'm having a really hard time seeing what is stopping them from falling down to near zero. It must be about 90% a speculators market by now. Seems the only thing someone would really need bitcoins for is to buy black market goods or services. I can't see where else the built in value is. It is way too volatile to park money in or really even to hide money. It just seems like it is a pure game of chance at this point.

[Jason14h]

I'm having a really hard time seeing what is stopping them from falling down to near zero. It must be about 90% a speculators market by now.

http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2013/...itcoin-bubble/

[Kelekin]

Originally Posted by nfotiu

I'm having a really hard time seeing what is stopping them from falling down to near zero. It must be about 90% a speculators market by now. Seems the only thing someone would really need bitcoins for is to buy black market goods or services. I can't see where else the built in value is. It is way too volatile to park money in or really even to hide money. It just seems like it is a pure game of chance at this point.

Perhaps you should do more research (or even some more reading within this thread). I think you've been missed the entire conceptual argument. Here's one of the best reads on it:

http://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/2013/...ue-overvalued/

[BigNumbers]

Bitcoin's only major use has been for Chinese to move their money. Now that that's being hamstrung their value will never again reach the levels we saw. I expect the $300 range will be more likely the new ceiling, as this currency is only actually used (eg: exchanged for stuff as a fiat should be) for the following purposes:

Chinese money laundering (not in the illicit sense)
Drugs
Guns


The Chinese factor was the biggest driver, and now that it's be cracked down on, I don't expect we'll see a recovery to previous levels ever again.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by BigNumbers

Bitcoin's only major use has been for Chinese to move their money. Now that that's being hamstrung their value will never again reach the levels we saw. I expect the $300 range will be more likely the new ceiling, as this currency is only actually used (eg: exchanged for stuff as a fiat should be) for the following purposes:

Chinese money laundering (not in the illicit sense)
Drugs
Guns


The Chinese factor was the biggest driver, and now that it's be cracked down on, I don't expect we'll see a recovery to previous levels ever again.

Why does everybody say this? Did Chinese banks actual transact in Bitcoins at any point? Bitcoin transfers are not facilitated by normal banking systems. Isn't all this panic selling a product of misinterpreting remarks out of China?

The government/banks said they would not handle Bitcoin transactions. That's pretty much what I read. Bitcoins are handled by private exchanges, not banks. We should still be at the status quo.

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

Why does everybody say this? Did Chinese banks actual transact in Bitcoins at any point? Bitcoin transfers are not facilitated by normal banking systems. Isn't all this panic selling a product of misinterpreting remarks out of China?

The government/banks said they would not handle Bitcoin transactions. That's pretty much what I read. Bitcoins are handled by private exchanges, not banks. We should still be at the status quo.

An immediate result of the Chinese government's decision was the requirement to submit ID numbers (passport, national ID card etc.) in order to trade. Not as appealing for secretly moving money around anymore.