What are the pitfalls of buying mining machines? Discount coupons that retail miners cannot get

In the previous article "What are the pitfalls of buying mining machines? "Attractive" futures mining machines", we mentioned that it is actually difficult for retail miners to buy mining machines directly from the official website of the mining machine manufacturer .
In fact, only a few large customers can sign orders directly with mining machine manufacturers to get goods. If ordinary miners and retail miners want to buy mining machines, they must go to mining machine dealers. Mining machine dealers are also divided into many levels. There are less than a dozen that can sign orders directly with mining machine manufacturers, and the rest are "second-hand" and "third-hand" mining machine dealers.

Compared with these large miners and mining machine dealers, retail miners need to pay a lot of costs when purchasing mining machines, such as higher prices, later delivery times, full prepayment, etc.

Today, let’s talk about one of the costs that retail miners pay when buying mining machines: the unavailable mining machine coupons .

01
Issuance of mining machine coupons

Mining machine coupons, like many other commodity coupons, are issued by mining machine manufacturers and can be used to deduct the amount of mining machine orders. Currently, the most famous and most circulated mining machine coupons in the industry are those issued by Bitmain, and other mining machine manufacturers rarely issue them.

Generally speaking, mining machine manufacturers will give mining machine coupons to customers in the following three situations:

1. Mining machine delivery time is delayed

When Bitmain signs a mining machine purchase contract with a customer, there will be a 10-day exemption period for the delivery time. For example, if the contract is signed for delivery on September 30, Bitmain can deliver the goods on October 10 at the latest. If the goods are not delivered after October 10, Bitmain will compensate the customer according to the theoretical income of the mining machine, and the form of compensation is often to send mining machine coupons. For example, according to the current mining difficulty and coin price, the theoretical net income of the Ant S19 mining machine is 34.82 yuan per day (the electricity fee is calculated based on the market custody price of 0.23 yuan/kWh during the flood season). If the mining machine is delivered after the exemption period, 34.82 yuan should be compensated every day.

Delays in the delivery of mining machines are very common in the industry, but it is rare for mining machine manufacturers like Bitmain to compensate for delays.

2. The quality of the mining machine is problematic

If there are defects in the quality or design of the mining machine, some mining machine manufacturers will also give coupons as compensation.

3. The market crashed and the price of mining machines was too high

At present, the mining machine manufacturers mainly sell futures mining machines, and the price of futures mining machines is set according to the current market conditions. However, "a day in the cryptocurrency world is like a year in the real world", the crypto market has been rising and falling, and is full of uncertainty. If the market conditions are very bad when the futures mining machines are delivered, the spot mining machines will be reduced in price a lot, which is equivalent to the futures mining machines being sold at a high price before. At this time, the mining machine manufacturers will also give corresponding coupons as compensation.

Taking the Antminer as an example, at the end of December 2019, the Ant T17e mining machine was reduced in price because the market conditions were very bad at the time. Bitmain issued mining machine coupons with a face value of 1,315 yuan for each customer who had previously purchased futures mining machines.

After the market plummeted on March 12 this year, Bitmain also gave coupons as compensation to customers who purchased Ant S17+ and T17+ mining machines between mid-February and the end of April this year.

02
Mining machine coupon transactions

Antminer coupons range in value from 1 yuan to 2,000 yuan, with validity periods of 30 days, 60 days, 180 days and 365 days. For example, there are currently a large number of Antminer coupons with a value of 1 yuan and a validity period of 12 months on the market.

Mining machine coupons can be transferred unlimited times without any handling fees, so it is equivalent to cash to a certain extent, but it can only be used to purchase mining machines, and the deduction amount cannot exceed 10% of the mining machine order amount.

The trading market for mining machine coupons is a very niche market , mainly composed of large miners, mining machine dealers and some scalpers who resell coupons for speculation. Why are there so few retail miners in this market? There are two reasons:

First, it is difficult for retail miners to buy mining machines directly from the official website of the mining machine manufacturer. For mining machines purchased from mining machine dealers, dealers generally do not give retail miners coupons.

Second, these coupons can only be used for mining machines purchased from the official. Many retail miners purchase mining machines from mining machine dealers, not from the official.

For large miners, mining machine manufacturers generally have sales managers who are responsible for docking. Through the matchmaking of sales managers, large miners can easily find buyers or sellers of coupons, and the amount of each transaction is very huge. During the interview, the editor also heard a very interesting story:

A big miner wants to buy 1,000 mining machines from Bitmain. Each mining machine in this batch will be given a coupon, but the big miner hopes to deduct it directly from the order. What to do? The big miner decided to borrow coupons from the mining machine dealer and return the coupons after the mining machine is in hand. In the process of discussing this plan, the sales manager of the mining machine manufacturer in charge of docking came up with another trick: buy 1 mining machine first, use the coupon for the purchase of the second mining machine, and use the coupon for the second mining machine for the third mining machine, and so on. Finally, 1,000 mining machines will be shipped together.

In this way, one coupon can leverage 1,000 mining machines to enjoy the coupon discount effect.

03
The impact of mining coupons

Mining machine coupons are a means of compensation for customers by mining machine manufacturers, but from the actual results, only large miners and mining machine dealers benefit in the end.

At present, the mining machine coupons on the market can be purchased at 70% to 92% of the face value, and can be used to deduct up to 10% of the mining machine order amount. When buying mining machines, many large miners often go to the market to buy a large number of mining machine coupons. With the preferential prices for large customers and the mining machine coupons, large miners can further reduce their mining machine costs and shorten the payback period of mining machines.

For example, the current spot price of the Antminer S19 is 17,600 yuan, and the maximum discount that can be obtained with coupons is 10%, which is 1,760 yuan. If these coupons are purchased at a 30% discount, it is equivalent to saving 528 yuan per mining machine. According to the current coin price, mining difficulty and market hosting electricity fees, the money saved requires retail miners to mine with the Antminer S19 mining machine for 15 days.

Some people joked: " The existence of mining machine coupons makes retail miners lose at the starting line. " How many truths are told in this joking way!

If you don’t want to lose at the starting line, you can actually find a particularly conscientious platform, such as B.TOP. B.TOP will return the coupons given by the mining machine manufacturer to the customer, even if the customer only purchased one mining machine, such as the coupon with a face value of 1,315 yuan mentioned above, which B.TOP returned to all buyers.

04
Conclusion

Mining machine coupons are coupons issued by mining machine manufacturers that can be used to deduct the amount of mining machine orders. From the actual results, only large miners and mining machine dealers benefit in the end, and retail miners often cannot get them. This is one of the prices that retail miners need to pay when purchasing mining machines.

Do you know what additional costs retail miners need to pay when purchasing mining machines? Feel free to share in the comments section.