Member Info for Hexam

"I can't hold onto a loss for that long, I admire your stubornous, i switched out the the US miners quite a while ago."

I don't think stubbornness is a good trait in investing so not to be admired! I should have got out when I first started having serious doubts around the 80p mark but I was greedy and didn't want to exit on a dip (that then turned into a freefall).

I did eventually sell most of them and bought US miners which have more than made up for my ARB losses. I even then averaged down on ARB when the BTC tide started to turn as a rising tide lifts all boats. So now not only am I up on Crypto generally but I am also much closer to break even on ARB (in pounds) although by banking some of the recent rises (including some more at 34p) I push the breakeven price further away each time. I now need 52p to breakeven.

It's still not been a good strategy though as I would have been much better off just focusing on CLSK, MARA etc. rather than keeping some interest here but that's my stubbornness getting in the way again!

Chuz - I don't think anybody is really daft enough to think ARB can get back to £3. More likely I think they are just the usual pump and dump merchants trying to prey on other people's FOMO.

One thing we can be quite sure of though is that like the previous set of rampers who would hear nothing bad against BTC, ARB or PW they will all quietly disappear when reality finally strikes for ARB (if they haven't already dumped first). As usual in these circumstances somebody is left holding the bags eventually.

In the meantime nobody can deny that it's an exciting ride up and who knows I may even end up in profit here at last :-)

Dagenham - I agree that fundamentals don't matter in the short term but who is saying that? All that Chuz and others like myself are saying is that ARB do not have the financial strength compared to their peers to thrive as a business longer term and it would take an extraordinary set of circumstances for that to change. We are seeing the worst of the £3 ramping crowd again (just look at the title of this thread) but even if the sp gets to £1 in the near future it's very unlikely to change where ARB will be in two years time.

Yes, but QBT isn't a mining company (though it might be one day) and if anything has more in common with software businesses. In any event a valuation by simply looking at the value of other companies is meaningless with so little in common. The value will be determined by how close to their 2.6x claim they are and what share of revenue they can negotiate with miners - they have little cost to worry about so a completely different model to miners who are so capital intensive and much more at the mercy of BTC price.

I think if they are anywhere close to their 2.6x claims and can negotiate half-decent deals then £300m mcap is VERY conservative but that's because of the huge revenue potential with a healthy dollop of sentiment on top - not the value of miners (who range so widely from about $100m to $5bn I think). As always it depends on what they really have beyond words and hype. It's likely to be boom or bust in my view - I can't really see much in between - and 2024 is very likely to be the year we find out which.

Odd. I didn’t think it had any peers?

"Hexham, do you think FG being a professor would make claims without being sure he could carry them through?"

Yes. Plenty of other AIM companies to draw examples of over-egged claims from.

"So you think this could actually turn how to be higher than the claim or lower with reason?"

Yes. Reason being that no-one can know how it really performs unless operating on actual machines (and a lot of them) mining BTC.

"Do you think as AI grows the figures could be higher or lower as it learns?"

Very possibly but let's get the 'basic' 2.6x first as that's taken long enough and will be more than sufficient on its own to rocket the sp.

"a deal based on 2.6x more BTC" - to be clear by this I mean that the terms of the deal clearly reflects that the miner involved believes the 2.6x (by having tested it themselves on a large number machines or by some other means). Until then the 2.6x is a claim, a very exciting one, but still just a claim.

"i dont think anyone objects to a balanced argument"

Really? I don't think I've seen a comment on here which is any way negative that hasn't been pounced upon with accusations of multiple IDs, wanting to get in lower or questioning why they are posting at all - along with general abuse of course.

If news breaks of a deal based on 2.6x more BTC then I think the sp will shoot towards £1 never mind 10p but I'm still branded a 'troll' by some for daring to suggest that such a deal is far from a nailed on certainty or that, shock horror', an AIM CEO is possibly over-selling his company's prospects a tad.

A balanced discussion would be very nice indeed but anybody looking for one here will I fear be largely disappointed.

So no convincing investment case then Roger? Thought not. Just more idiotic conspiracy theories instead. I'll leave you to your delusions.

"Doesn't the HALVING have a negative effect on miners,"

Depends on BTC price. If halving causes BTC to more than double then it's positive. Less than double then it's negative. Bit oversimplified but that's the crux of it.

"Conspiratorial enough for you?"

Yes, and idiotic enough too - just like all your mindless ramping.

As many others have said - there is no reasonable investment case for ARB (that looks forward more than a year or so) HOWEVER until the money runs out there will be plenty of trading possibilities with sentiment/FOMO, BTC, ETF approval, halving, ARB being the sole UK listed miner etc. etc. all capable of pushing ARB much higher than it is now. Of course with that comes risk too so you pay your money and take your chance.

You are quick to criticise others but how about countering with a reasoned scenario, with numbers, as to how you can see ARB thriving as a business in, say, two years time? I'd love to see a convincing investment case put forward for ARB that looks beyond two years (and all the hype) but oddly one never appears...

"Stampee- absolutely, mining income will drop for a lot of miners in the next halving."

Make up your mind. You keep banging on about how BTC will be $100k++ due to halving with all the predictions you keep quoting in which case most miners will be better off in terms of income post-halving, and more profitable, than they are now. So are you expecting BTC not to reach $100k now?

Of all the scenarios being bought out is probably the most unlikely. Who would want to buy 2EH or so of old machines (which is basically all ARB is) for about $250m (current mcap plus $70m debt) plus all the aggravation that goes with it. They'd be much better off just buying new machines. Even at a substantial discount to current mcap they are probably still better off just buying new (the depreciated value in the accounts of ARB machines is now under $50m - doubt they would fetch much more than this on the open market).

"Currently, publicly listed miners mine at a cost of $10,000-$15,000 per bitcoin"

No - that's only the direct costs (mainly electricity). Total 'all-in' cost will be in the range $30 to $50k with ARB at the top end of that. Those figures include depreciation and other non-cash costs so cash outgo is lower - perhaps $20k-$30k BEFORE any capex.

I still think though that your estimated cash burn figures for ARB in Q4 are simply scaremongering based on what we know. They should be comfortably generating cash in Q4 provided there aren't any sizeable one-offs that we don't know about - as should all miners currently.

The fundamentals are poor for ARB, there is no denying that and I've posted several times to that effect, but you seem to be going out of your way to make them appear even worse than they actually are.

"They also completed the deployment of BlockMiner machines in September - based on standard terms I would expect this to negatively impact Q4 cash burn." - Why?

Bottom line is that in Q3 cash cost per BTC mined was $27.5k. I cannot see any way this will have gone up enough to offset the benefit of higher revenues due to higher BTC price especially given that the number mined (including transaction fees) was actually higher in Oct/Nov than Q3. In addition Q3 suffered because of adverse movement in working capital. So whilst they will hit a cash problem at some point, at the moment they look ok to me.

"Based on cash burn of $4m per quarter - Argo needs CASH desperately"

They may not be profitable at the moment but they are certainly not burning cash. BTC is a lot higher than it was in Q3 and they are also benefiting from higher transaction fees. So despite difficulty still increasing they are generating cash in Q4, not haemorrhaging it. So whilst I agree the long term future in bleak, and they may still do an equity raise very soon to take advantage of the higher sp, they do not appear to have an immediate cash issue as such. They just don't generate enough of it to make a big dent in the debt or to buy that many machines. It will quickly become an issue though post-halving (unless BTC really rockets).

MNS - the text you pasted specifically says "income" and doesn't mention gains which are taxed completely differently.

WHT is NOT paid on capital gains. Put it this way, it certainly hasn't be paid on the gains I've made on CLSK, MARA and HUT within my ISA. WHT only applies to income. Would be impossible anyway to deduct from gains at source.

I thought withholding tax was only paid on dividends - which are unlikely anyway for miners. There is no tax on gains so long as you are investing via an ISA. So as far as I can see, for all intents and purposes, investing in US miners via an ISA is tax-free (unless they start paying dividends).

“That aside, if btc is at 100k then smart people who continually test their hypotheses like James from Incest Answers , and Sebastian the bitcoin mining guy both think Argo would be safe at 100k.”

It may make them safe for a while but $100k is certainly not enough to make them profitable post halving so they need more to survive longer term. If James or Sebastian think otherwise then maybe they are not as smart as all that but I suspect they aren’t suggesting that (as they are better than most out there - though neither is infallible). It’s better really to draw your own conclusions than rely on others.