Quote from: alienesb on August 21, 2015, 02:34:09 PM

Quote from: sidehack on August 21, 2015, 02:11:10 PM

Quote from: SockPuppetAccount on August 21, 2015, 01:16:29 PM

Quote from: sidehack on August 21, 2015, 12:58:08 AM

Did you buy your used A2 for the same or more than the guy who sold it to you bought it new? The point is not that selling hardware secondhand is in general a bad thing - by no means am I saying that.
The point is selling hardware secondhand for more than it is likely actually worth in order to recoup your investment is a bad thing - which is to say, "making about 1/2 or so back on your money and you sell them used for just about the price you paid for them new" (if not more).

Unless something atypical like flat diff is happening (which can't be counted on enough to "rinse and repeat") and the viability of the machine is actually retained during that time, selling it for near new price after several months means ripping someone off. You get your "ROI" by effectively stealing it from someone else. That's exactly what's happening with Bitmain selling used S5 for the same or more than they sold them new several months ago. If the diff had gone up more than about 10% in the last six months (like the 50-100% that would have been expected had the trends of the previous two years kept steady), nobody in their right mind would be buying S5 for the same money they paid at Christmas.

I feel the argument should be well-qualified enough to require no further defense, and as it's pretty off-topic at this point, I'll say nothing further on the subject. How 'bout them BM1385 chips, eh?

Huh? I use the same strategy with my ASIC purchases and obviously there is a lot of guesswork and a little bit of luck involved, but I have profited off the S1, S3, S5, and SP20 by using this same strategy. When I decide to sell my old gear, I do so based on what I paid for it, how quickly difficulty is rising, what I have mined so far, the season of the year (save on heating bill in winter), and the approximate going rate for the miner on the second hand market. I list the miner on ebay at 0.01 cents with no reserve, offer free shipping, set it for a week, and thats it. Knowingly misrepresenting a miner as new, something it isn't, higher performance or better condition than it is, etc are all bad things. But if the free market is overvaluing mining gear at a particular moment in time, I'm stealing from someone if I sell it? That doesn't make sense. Some people have cheap or free electricity, some people dont care about ROI and it's just a toy for them, some people are simply making a poorly timed purchase because they don't know how to properly assess the value of the mining gear. It doesn't matter. As long as they are freely choosing to purchase the item and I am not misleading them, there is nothing wrong with it. It's value is exactly what the free market will pay for it. Sometimes the free market overvalues a product or service, sometimes the free market undervalues a product or service. If you are able to accurately gauge the true value of an item better than the rest of the market, whether it is the ASIC market, stock market, or hell, the grocery market, you will gain anytime you are able to sell something while it is overvalued and buy something when it is undervalued. This is just how a free market capitalistic economy and natural price discovery functions.

Alright, maybe I should simplify a bit. Selling used miners at fair market value is good. In the past five months or so, with relatively flat diff, the FMV for something like the S5 has been relatively unchanged, so running one for five months and then selling it for new price actually works.
However, for the several years before then, and for the future probably starting within the next two months, the diff is not flat. So the current conditions are somewhat of an aberration.
The guy is saying the proper course of action has been, and will be, to buy a miner, run it, and sell it for approximately new price.
So let's say someone buys a $500 miner, expected breakeven about 9 months out with typical power cost. He then runs it for three months. The diff goes up 25% in that time (4% biweekly increase, historically fairly reasonable). He then tries to sell it for $500. Would not you assume he's a fool? Would not you assume anyone buying it would also be a fool? Would not the expected market value for that $500 machine have dropped, probably to below $400? With the exception of the past few months, this has been the case since the first day of ASIC mining (or FPGA mining, probably even GPU days). Depreciation keeps pace with diff increase (and is slowed by increasing coin price, but historically increasing coin price increases the diff even faster). Take a look at what S1 prices did in early 2013. Diff went way up really fast, coin prices went down, and the price for an S1 dropped about 90% in something like four months. You think my December S1 would have sold in March for the 4BTC paid for it, or more like 8BTC if priced in dollars? Only to a fool.

So I'd say that, in general, with some exceptions, someone who takes a sizeable chunk out of the viable life of a miner and then sells it at new price is not selling at expected fair market value, and someone that buys it probably didn't do his research to know he was being ripped off.

The point is not, and never has been, that selling secondhand hardware at fair market value is bad. The point is, and always has been, that successfully selling used hardware at well above market value is taking advantage of a fool, which is unethical. Implying that the proper strategy for making positive returns on mining is (and always has been) taking advantage of fools, well I like to think this community is better than that.

So if a farmer buys a tractor and uses it a couple of seasons then decides to sell it, and because that tractor is no longer made but is still in demand, he manages to get just about what he paid for it back is that wrong too? It's supply and demand.

At one point Bitmain sold miners in the $340 range then at another they were selling for over $450ish and at times they just were not available. It's about percieved value to the buyer and that is not ripping someone off.

You have a rather jaded view of the secondary market. I bet there will be people selling your stick at higher than sticker price on eBay.

I think it is more of an integrity thing and in the Bitcoin world we so much scamming and deceiving he has just become tired of it, which I understand and is totally against any forms of either making money for nothing or second hand selling for profit but like you said it is a case of supply and demand so I get both sides of it but I think Bitmain has more supply than they let on and self mine is the true issue.