In less than a year, the assets of a Hangzhou Bitcoin player dropped from 10 million to 100,000 and changed his career to selling fruits

Recently, it was revealed online that mining machines were dumped on the ground like garbage (video screenshot)

From March to November this year, the price of Bitcoin fell all the way.

"I am the tragedy." Talking about the recent plunge in Bitcoin prices, Mr. Wang (pseudonym), a well-known Bitcoin player in Hangzhou, told the Express reporter that he had countless opportunities to get close to financial freedom, but now he is empty-handed.

In his circle of friends, the reporter also saw a short video of several workers using a cement truck to haul mining machines and dumping them on the ground like garbage. At first glance, it looked like a construction site. The mining machines in the yard had been piled up into a small mountain, and the scene was in a mess.

Mining machines are essential equipment for mining. In the past, the price of a mainstream mining machine was more than 5,000 yuan, and sometimes as high as 30,000 yuan, and it was even hard to find one. Now, small and medium-sized mines have closed down one after another, and second-hand mining machines are being sold off frantically. The mining machine that was sold for 30,000 yuan that year is now only transferred for 1,000 yuan. Reporter Wang Xiaoxiao

From near financial freedom to poverty in less than a year

At the end of 2017, the price of Bitcoin once exceeded $20,000, setting a record high. Since then, the cryptocurrency market has continued to be sluggish. Starting in November, Bitcoin once plummeted. On November 19 alone, it fell by nearly 12% in less than 6 hours, and is currently approaching $4,000.

This means that in less than a year, Bitcoin has fallen by 80%. With such drastic price fluctuations, the mood of cryptocurrency players is also ups and downs.

"There have been countless opportunities to cash out. Some people around me who were born in the 1990s or even 1995s sold their stocks last year and cashed in an average of 50 million yuan. But I and a group of brothers born in the 1980s have been holding on until now. We can only hope for the best." Mr. Wang looked helpless.

From being just one step away from achieving financial freedom to living a Buddhist life now, in just one year, I went from "heaven" to "hell".

"The specific amount is not convenient to disclose. You can understand that the book assets have been directly wiped out by nearly two zeros, from tens of millions to hundreds of thousands, and now only a small amount is left." He revealed to reporters.

In a well-known Bitcoin forum, players who suffered heavy losses were also "crying out in grief", with some veteran players even saying that their assets had lost more than 85% and declaring "bankruptcy".

Will they continue to stick to it? Mr. Wang did not directly answer the reporter's question, but just said: "This industry has faith."

Mining and selling coins cannot pay the electricity bills, and mining machines are being sold off crazily

Affected by the price of Bitcoin, the market for mining machines has also plummeted. Some small mining farms can no longer operate, resulting in the situation of selling off as shown in the above video.

This Hangzhou Bitcoin player not only speculates on Bitcoin, but also mines Bitcoin. He recalled that the price of mainstream mining machines was around 5,000 yuan, and some popular mining machines cost more than 10,000 yuan. At the end of last year, when Bitcoin mining was at its hottest, the price of mining machines doubled, and it was even hard to find a machine, which made the merchants selling mining machines in Shenzhen Huaqiangbei make a lot of money.

It is understood that several mainstream mining machine manufacturers in China all ship their products in Huaqiangbei. According to statistics, this place has become the supply and distribution center for 90% of the world's mining machines. In its heyday, the mining machine sales storefronts occupied the 1st to 7th floors of a building in Huaqiangbei. Someone described the madness at that time like this: "Those who buy mining machines have to kneel on the ground to beg the sellers of mining machines. Selling you one is a great honor." Until February this year, the market sentiment took a sharp turn for the worse. Now, there are only more than ten mining machine stores in the entire Huaqiangbei, and no one is interested.

"Last year, I rented an office, invested hundreds of thousands of yuan, bought more than a dozen machines, and started mining with a few friends. Like many small miners, I died while mining," Mr. Wang explained. "Once the computing power of the mining machine cannot reach the market price of the currency, the machine will be shut down because we can't even pay the electricity bill."

The income from mining and selling coins by small miners cannot cover the huge electricity bills. Coupled with the sharp drop in the price of Bitcoin, small mines found that they were no longer profitable, and second-hand mining machines were sold off frantically. "Specifically, it is not just the electricity bill, this is calculated based on several variables, including the current coin price, the total network computing power, electricity bills, hosting fees, service fees, etc. In addition, mining machines need to be updated and iterated." Mr. Wang said.

He also revealed that some people in the industry are selling off their products, while others are buying back large quantities of second-hand and nearly scrapped machines at low prices and shipping them abroad to some war-torn countries, where electricity is almost free. After recovering the investment in a very short period of time, the rest is profit, and if there is a problem, the machine will be directly scrapped.

Hangzhou mining machine seller "cuts losses" and switches to micro-business

Affected by the sharp drop in the price of virtual currencies including Bitcoin, some mining farms have begun to remove mining machines from the shelves, and mining farms have been closed on a large scale, and second-hand mining machines have been sold off frantically. While miners are leaving the market one after another, the upstream of the industry chain - mining machine sales and mining machine hosting companies have begun to change their careers.

During the gold rush in the western United States, everyone rushed to dig for gold, but the best-selling items were shovels and jeans. Similarly, when the price of Bitcoin continued to rise in the second half of last year, some people set their sights on the mining machine business.

Xiao Yu is a mining machine seller in Hangzhou. Until the end of March this year, he was still promoting mining machines on WeChat Moments. "Now is the best time to order mining machines. They won't be cheap until the second half of the year!" "Book a mining machine, starting at 100 units, and shipped in 2 weeks."

In fact, in February this year, as the price of Bitcoin continued to fall, the price of mining machines began to "dive." "The price changes every day, sometimes it drops by 1,000 yuan a day. It's simply a 'mining disaster'," Xiao Yu said.

The mining machine sold by Xiao Yu is the Antminer S9, which is very popular in the market. According to his recollection, the initial sales price was close to 20,000 yuan, and reached 35,000 yuan at the end of 2017.

At the beginning of the year, when the price of S9 dropped slightly, Xiao Yu ordered some futures in an attempt to sell them at the high point of the market. At that time, he firmly believed that the price would rebound, as it had happened before.

Investment guru Peter Lynch said that you can't see the future in the rearview mirror. With the mentality of buying low and selling high, Xiao Yu ended up losing a lot of money. He originally planned to make tens of thousands of yuan from a machine, but ended up losing thousands of yuan.

In April this year, Xiao Yu completely withdrew from the cryptocurrency circle after selling his stockpiled goods. He switched to micro-business, selling mobile phone accessories and fruits, and occasionally forwarding news about blockchain.

"Those who seized the opportunity first made money from this market trend, while those who were a step late may have lost everything," said Xiao Yu.

Industry insiders: There may be further declines in the future

For investors with dreams, is there still hope for digital currency?

After this round of collapse, the market began to show extremely pessimistic expectations. Some industry insiders shouted that the winter of digital currency has come, while others said that this decline is just the beginning.

Bloomberg analyst McClung warned that the downward momentum of cryptocurrencies could get worse, and he even predicted that the price of Bitcoin could evaporate 70% of its market value and fall below the $1,500 mark.

Chen Weixing, another star in the cryptocurrency circle, said at the recent "Reconstructing the World 2018 Blockchain New Economy Hangzhou Summit" that the cryptocurrency market may be worse than imagined.

"In the future, the price of Bitcoin may fall another 50%. If the liquidity of this industry drops another 50%, most practitioners will be out of business. Maybe four months later, practitioners who are still active at the conference will be embarrassed to go on stage. When the market freezes, it is time for everyone to really think about the use of blockchain technology." said Chen Weixing.