Quote from: stripykitteh on May 18, 2013, 06:18:51 PM

Quote from: fently on May 18, 2013, 06:09:08 PM

A simpler calculation: there are approximately 9 million coins remaining to be mined. 10% of that, divided by 400,000 shares gives you 2.25 BTC per share. So things like hardware sales, transaction fees, and optimism that we'll have more than 10% share of the network had darn well better make up for the long wait to earn those 2.25 BTC. That might be reasonable. Any thoughts? (sure beats estimates based on infinity)

Yes, if you're looking at the next 3.5 years until the next halving, it's not clear that a valuation much higher than the current share price is warranted. After that, no one is seriously claiming that returns will be infinite, but do you agree that in the long term it's all going to be about the transaction fees? Bitcoin is a payment system, so it's going to be about how fast those Bitcoins fly around the container. The faster they fly, the more miners will make. At the moment it's very difficult to predict how soon and how fast they will be flying, but that's where most of the ongoing value in AM will be if it survives and thrives.

Oh the halving affects the rate, but not the total amount. Not to mention, we're currently at much higher than 10% of all coins even before counting hardware sales. So if we continue as we are now, we'd probably be looking at close to 50%. I'm just looking at the pessimistic, ultra-conservative scenario of 10% between mining, hardware sales, and transaction fees. Regarding the transaction fees, it is indeed difficult to determine what will happen, but if they aren't high enough to provide incentive for the miners, then they won't go through. Funny thing that.. we may end up mining not because of the transaction fees but because failure to mine means our existing bitcoins may become worthless.