A fool and his money are soon parted. The 'stupid money' will eventually dry up, and then ASIC manufacturers will have no choice but lower their pricing to match what the intelligent market is willing to pay.

Of course, it's a fine balance. The question has always been, "Why would a hardware reseller sell equipment for less than he can mine with it?"

However, the 'stupid money' that seems to abound in the bitcoin community is only half the equation. People being willing to buy an item that will never ROI is what makes hardware sellers willing to sell in the first place. If hardware manufacturers can make more by simply running the equipment themselves, why bother with the hassles and logistics of sales, service, shipping, etc, etc?

Anybody who buys hardware at more than ROI is taking a MASSIVE gamble that difficulty is going to drop, or at least remain flat... Unfortunately for them, there seems to be no shortage of people willing to take that bet, and so difficulty continues to climb...