Despite all the evangelizing about the blockchain’s decentralized nature, the days of a global network of laptop-toting techies mining Bitcoin from home or the coffee shop appear to be over. Take the world’s biggest Bitcoin mining collective, Bitmain, which runs 25,000 custom-built machines in Inner Mongolia just to make about $250,000 in daily revenue, or $91 million annually. At $6 billion globally, Bitcoin mining revenues aren’t worth the bet yet. With AMD trading at 100 times this year’s earnings, according to Bloomberg data, and NVIDIA at about 50 times, any tail off in crypto demand might hurt. One new Bitcoin spin-off, “Bitcoin Gold,” wants to be a new algorithm that will benefit bedroom miners over the Bitmains of the world.

Source: Washington Post November 22, 2017 09:11 UTC