--google translate, sorry for my poor Enghlish--
# How much wool can a miner have? ——Talk about the BCH-IFP
Obviously, BCH is currently the only decentralized currency at the protocol layer developer level among encrypted digital currencies. Is this good or bad? Hard to say. Decentralization is no longer the political correctness of the currency circle as it was before 2017.
A coin needs developers and money, and decentralized developers need more money. This may be why BCH discusses IFP-the BCH Basic Agreement Construction Fund-every six months or so.
IFP refers to a certain percentage of the mining rewards of BCH and is sent to the designated developer receiving address for development expenditure.
No, the upcoming hard fork upgrade scheduled for BCH on November 15th, the BCH community is arguing about this again. This time, Amaury, the core member of the Bitcoin ABC development team, will build a change in the protocol layer that will distribute 8% of miner rewards to the designated address.
I watched the IFP for a long time, and found that the discussion was actually quite adequate, but there was only one missing piece. It seemed that there was nothing about the miners.
Is mining profitable?
In a fully competitive free market, the average profit of an industry will soon be reduced to just enough for the practitioners to survive. This is common sense.
Mining is obviously like this, and the profit of mining is actually very low.
The vast majority of mining behaviors are like this. Invest in mining machines, build mining farms or trust other mining farms, sell the coins mined every day, or sell them at least once a month, and pay the electricity bill every month. The money is gross profit. When the miner sells the mining machine, the net profit of the business can be calculated. The net profit will be the gross profit accumulated by selling coins, plus the residual value left by selling old mining machines, and subtracting the initial investment to buy mining machines.
What I want to say is that the vast majority of mining companies like this have very, very low profits, and they lose more money. I can't come up with accurate data, but I have personal experience.
In the middle of 2018, I bought a batch of mining machines for about 4200 yuan. Since then, I have experienced the difficulty of mining. The result of my calculation is that the payback was realized this year.
In China, companies that are mainly engaged in mining business end up losing a lot in mining. Think of the once brilliant roast cat. The well-known ones are haobtc, jua, and bw. These were once the pride of Chinese miners, but now they have all withdrawn from the mining industry. Of course there are more foreigners going bankrupt, do you remember Ghash.io, bitfury, bitclub? Now in SHA256 mining, foreigners are almost gone.
Individuals or small businesses lose more money when they mine.
In such an industry with such fierce competition, can 8% of its revenue be taken away?
Why are there so many stories about mining fortune?
There are many stories about mining and making a fortune in the arena, and everyone knows who it is without naming them.
Those people I know who make big money from mining have three main sources of income.
One is tun coins. They don’t sell them until the price is low, and only sell when the price is high.
The second is to open leverage. Leverage includes, interest-based fund-raising mining in RMB, mortgage coins or mining machine borrowing electricity fees. These levers amplify the gains when done right.
The third is the mining machine. When the market is low, they buy mining machines to mine, but in a bull market, smart miners will sell the coins and mining machines together for arbitrage.
To be precise, those who make a lot of money from mining are making money from the financial industry, not from honest mining.
In addition, in China's mining industry, it is actually mining pools and mining farms that can make steady money, not miners. There are many myths circulating in the arena of mining to make money. In fact, behind them is a successful mining pool.
Why didn't the miners stand up to discuss IFP?
This is a very strange thing. In the previous discussions on IFP, Chinese miners represented by BTC.top are very active participants, but this round seems to have nothing to do with Chinese miners.
The possible reason is.
First, the development of BCH has been very poor in the past three years. At present, BCH computing power accounts for less than 3% of the SHA256 computing power of the entire network, which is almost negligible. Chinese miners are busy with their livelihoods, and they are studying refined management to mine BTC. How can they manage this 3%?
Second, BCH has been de-Chinese. Very few people in China care about BCH. The miners are mainly in China.
Go to the few BCH Chinese communities to watch their discussions on IFP, and you will find that they are actually investors. A friend of mine joked that a bunch of people waiting to sell coins are discussing how to collect miner taxes. This is a very strange thing.
In an industry where average profits are already so low, taking another 8% of revenue away will undoubtedly cause the hatred of miners.
--以下是中文原文--
很显然，BCH是目前加密数字货币里在协议层开发者层面唯一一个还是去中心化的币，这到底是好，还是不好？难说。去中心化，早已经不是在2017年前那样是币圈的政治正确了。
一个币需要开发者，需要钱，去中心化的开发者，需要钱更多。这可能是BCH为什么每隔半年左右就要讨论一次IFP——BCH基础协议建设基金——的原因。
IFP是指从BCH的挖矿奖励中，抽取一定比例发给指定的开发者接受地址，用于开发支出。
这不，即将到来的11月15日BCH预定好的硬分叉升级，BCH社区又在争吵此事。这一次Bitcoin ABC开发组的核心成员阿毛里（Amaury）将在协议层上内置一个分走8%矿工奖励到指定地址的变更。
IFP这事，我围观了好久，发现讨论的其实挺充分的，但独独缺了一环，好像没矿工什么事。
挖矿利润高吗？
在一个充分竞争的自由市场里，一个行业的平均利润将很快降低到仅够从业者活着的地步。这是一个常识。
挖矿显然就是这样，挖矿的利润其实非常低。
绝大多数挖矿行为是这样的，投资买矿机，建矿场或托管给别的矿场，每天挖到的币及时卖掉，或者至少一个月卖一次，每月交完电费，剩下的钱，就是毛利。到了矿工将矿机卖掉，就可以统计这笔生意的净利润了。将卖币累计留下的毛利，加上卖旧矿机留下的残值，再减去最初投资买矿机的钱，才是净利润。
我要说的是，绝大多数这样挖矿的，利润都非常非常低，赔钱的多了去了。我拿不出精确的数据，但我有亲身经历。
我在2018年中，一台4200块钱左右买了一批矿机。从此体验了挖矿的艰难。我的核算结果是在今年才实现回本。
在中国，主营挖矿业务的公司，最终挖矿赔本挺多的。想想曾经辉煌无比的烤猫。知名的还有haobtc和jua，bw，这些曾经是中国矿工骄傲，现在都退出了挖矿行当。当然老外倒闭的更多，你是否还记得Ghash.io，bitfury，bitclub。现在在SHA256挖矿上，老外几乎没了。
个人或小企业挖矿，赔钱的就更多了。
就是这么一个竞争如此惨烈的行业，还有8%的营收可以抽走吗？
为什么留下了很多挖矿发财的佳话？
江湖上流传了很多挖矿发大财的故事，不用点名，大家都知道是谁。
我认识的那些挖矿挣大钱的人，主要收益来自三方面。
一是屯币，他们都是币价低时挖到了不卖，价格高时才卖。
二是开杠杆。开杠杆包括了，按人民币计息募资挖矿，抵押币或矿机借电费。这些杠杆在做对的时候放大了收益。
三是炒矿机。市场低位时买入矿机挖矿，但牛市时，聪明的矿工都会把币和矿机一同卖掉套利。
准确点说，挖矿挣大钱的，挣的都是金融行业的钱，而不是老实挖矿的钱。
另外，在中国挖矿行业能够稳定挣钱的其实是矿池和矿场，而不是矿工。很多江湖上流传的挖矿挣钱的神话，其实他们背后都是一个成功的矿池。
为什么矿工没有站出来讨论IFP？
这是一个很奇怪的事，前几次讨论IFP，以BTC.top为代表中国的矿工是很积极的参与者，但这一轮好像没中国矿工什么事。
可能的原因是。
第一，BCH近三年发展非常差，目前BCH算力占全网SHA256算力不到3%，几乎是可以忽略不计的。中国矿工都忙着生计去了，研究精细化管理挖BTC，哪有功夫管这点3%。
第二，BCH已经去中国化了。现在中国非常少的人关心BCH。而矿工主要在中国。
去仅有的几个BCH中国社区看他们关于IFP的讨论，你会发现，其实都是投资者。我有朋友开玩笑说，都是一帮等着卖币的人在讨论怎么收矿工税。这是很诡异的事。
在一个平均利润已经那么低的行业，再抽走8%的营收，毫无疑问会成为引起矿工的仇恨。
Nice