We invested in AM to invest in a company that produces ASIC miners to mine bitcoins. I want my bitcoins to fund MINING. If I wanted to invest in an exchange, then I would have invested in an exchange.
There is a direct logical contradiction to claiming that AM is a "growth company" and that bitcoin mining suffers from the tragedy of the commons. I see that thinking is difficult for you, so I will break it down:
A growth company is a company with rapidly expending revenues and rapidly expanding costs. Every dollar invested will return more than a dollar but not immediately. As a result a growth company typically requires additional capital and cannot pay out dividends. If bitcoin mining truly suffers from the tragedy of the commons, then each dollar invested will return less than one dollar. In this situation no mining company could possibly be a growth company.
AM's revenue is very much capped by bitcoin's scheduled release and the demand for bitcoin mining hardware. As a result AM has likely come close or already achieved to its maximum revenue (revenue is not equal to profit). Revenues may very well slowly decline or stagnate but that is fine.
Investing in 130 nm devices to invest in bitcoin mining was an AMAZING investment when AM launched. It was genius and the shareholders profited enormously. That is no longer the situation and AM has to operate in a changing industry.
By the way, bitcoin mining is not even close to a "tragedy of the commons" situation. Tragedy of the commons also doesn't really apply when the resource cannot be exhausted. You are mis-applying the concept but I understand your point so I originally ignored this point.
AM fit the description of a company with "rapidly expanding revenues and rapidly expanding costs" up until very recently, did it not? Its decision to pidgeonhole itself into mining, pursuing a fixed number of bitcoins with a growing amount of competition, is why it has ceased growing, despite the fact that it is valued like the growth company it so recently was.
Growth companies are supposed to grow. AM is the first "growth" company I have ever seen that has managed to shrink its revenue. I only consider it a growth company because it is priced like one.
Dude, just take a moment to think. Could AM's revenues continued to expand? I think most rational people would say no. It could not gain a greater share of the network hashrate, nor could it realistically sell significantly more hardware. Thus it transformed from a growth company into a mature company. That is just a natural progression for all industries that can't be prevented without creating barriers to entry that are not cost. There is nothing wrong with that, and mature companies can still be very profitable.
Now think about investing. I give friedcat 100 dollars to build a farm and mine bitcoins. He then earns 3 bitcoins, then I want him to return me the 3 bitcoins or invest in more mining equipment! I don't want to him to go investing it in random, unrelated fields that prove to be far less profitable or even fail to generate a return. As an investor I wanted to invest in MINING. Now add to the fact that friedcat has already stated that exchanges are more heavily scrutinized in China, then the exchanges would actually bring substantial risk to our mining operation. That is an even worse result!
I think you are greatly underestimating the value a company in a mature industry that has comparative advantages. It can continue to operate indefinitely at a profit. That is an extremely valuable company.
You've just called a ~year old company whose competition hasn't even started launching products yet "mature".
Expanding is a very risky move for a young company, but young companies are risky 100% of the time. Focusing on core competencies is important, but if Google JUST licensed their search engine and never said "hey, we should start doing this advertising thing!", where do you think they'd be?
Follow the money.
(To pre-empt your "it IS mature!" argument - no, it's not.