This week, Aleo officials have released a series of positive information about the project progress. The mainnet is really coming. According to the official statement, the acceptance standards on the development side have been met. Next, the beta version of the testnet will be tested, followed by code freezing. If the test goes well, the mainnet rehearsal will start on July 1, and it will be directly on the mainnet if there are no problems. The official has not yet announced the specific details of this rehearsal, but it is very likely that it is the incentive testnet mentioned earlier, and this incentive will also be the last incentive before the mainnet goes online. For more predictions about the incentive testnet, you can watch the previous program.
Next, I will combine the latest official economic model to analyze the factors that affect the income of the first mine. The scale of the total network computing power forecast will directly affect the daily output. The computing power after the main network is launched is mainly divided into two parts. One is the previous Ethereum miners, who have a large number of idle graphics cards; the other is the miners who bought new graphics cards. Let's first look at the computing power of Ethereum miners. According to Etherscan data, on May 13, 2022, the computing power of Ethereum reached 1126 TH/s, setting a new historical record. Among them, the computing power of graphics cards accounts for about 90%, which is about 11.26 million according to the 3080 graphics card. Of course, these graphics cards will not all be invested in Aleo mining, because some low-performance graphics cards cannot be used for Aleo mining, and the main network is constantly postponed. Many Ethereum miners have transformed or sold their graphics cards. We optimistically estimate that according to the retention of 50%, there are still 5.625 million graphics cards on the market. The second part is the miners who bought new graphics cards. Due to multiple official delays, there are relatively few new miners before the fourth quarter of 2023. From the fourth quarter of 2023 to now, due to the demand for GPUs from a number of projects such as IO.NET and IRON, the price of GPUs has been hyped up again, and the price increase has reached 30%. At present, 3080 has been out of stock, and 4070 has been out of stock since late January due to insufficient production capacity. We take the sales volume of graphics cards in the fourth quarter of 2023 as the base number. Assuming that 5% of the 9.5 million graphics cards belong to new Aleo miners, the number of new additions is 475,000. Ethereum miners plus new miners, the total number of graphics cards is about 6.1 million. Without considering the price of mining machines, the electricity cost of graphics cards is equivalent to the price cost of fixed investment in Aleo tokens. At present, the more common graphics cards for Aleo mining are 3080, 3080TI and 4070, if calculated at 0.6 yuan/kWh. The following is the daily electricity cost of the three graphics cards.
The power consumption of the 3080 graphics card is 320W, which means it consumes 7.68 kWh of electricity per day at full load, and the daily electricity bill is about 4.7 yuan.
The power consumption of the 3080TI graphics card is 350W, which is 8.4 kWh per day at full load, and the daily electricity bill is about 5.04 yuan.
The power consumption of the 4070 graphics card is 222W, which means it consumes 5.328 kWh of electricity per day at full load, and the daily electricity bill is about 3.2 yuan.
According to the latest official economic model, the output of PoSW in the first year is about 72 million, plus two-thirds of the coinbase reward goes to miners, so the total output will be about 145 million. Without considering the growth of computing power, assuming that there are 6.1 million graphics cards participating in the first year, using 3080 as a comparison, the annual electricity consumption is about 10.464 billion yuan (1.43 billion US dollars), then the price of the currency is break-even at 10U.
In other words, as long as the price of Aleo is higher than 10U, then your mining is equivalent to buying Aleo tokens at the cost of 10U. According to my previous comparison between Aleo and filecoin projects, if the price of Aleo copies fil, it can be stabilized at around 30U for a long time. In this way, based on the cost of graphics card electricity, the profit of the first mine is still relatively optimistic.
How to evaluate the mining cost of mining machines
When calculating mining costs, we also divide them into two categories:
1. Ethereum miners: own graphics card + electricity costs
2. New miners: mining machine price + electricity cost
For self-owned graphics cards, there is no payback period. As long as the output is higher than the electricity cost, you can keep it running. Here we mainly talk about how new miners can evaluate mining costs and payback periods. The following is the calculation formula:
Daily mining cost = mining machine price ÷ mining days + electricity cost
The number of mining days here mainly considers two time points: one is the time when Asic mining machines are put into production; the other is the time when Asic mining machines occupy a large number of the market. The former will dilute the computing power to a certain extent, and the latter will cause some GPU mining machines to shut down completely.
According to previous estimates, Asic mining machines will be launched 6 to 9 months after the mainnet is launched. As for the time to occupy the market, it may be necessary to combine the token performance after the mainnet is launched and the mining income for further evaluation.
How to calculate the payback period
Generally speaking, the first thing that partners who consult Aleo ask about is the payback period. In fact, as I emphasized before, for machines with the same configuration, the main thing to look at is the computing power cost. The lower the computing power cost, the shorter the payback period.
The following is the calculation formula
Payback period = mining machine cost ÷ (daily output * coin price - daily electricity cost)
If it is the same 36000C/S machine, the electricity cost is relatively fixed, and the daily output is related to the computing power of the entire network, and basically will not be too different, then the cost of the mining machine will ultimately affect the payback time. Here I will not compare the prices of mining machines in the community. You can make comparisons based on this logic when investigating.
In addition, the return on investment must also include the residual value of the graphics card. The price of the graphics card will lose 10% by default within a year, plus the damage rate of the graphics card is 10%, so after a year, if you sell it directly, the residual value of the graphics card is about 70%-80%. Note that this is the residual value of the graphics card, not the price of the mining machine, so when buying a mining machine, the less the premium, the more profit you will get in the end.
In general, most of the people who participate in the Aleo first mine are new miners, except for the Ethereum miners who own graphics cards. At present, the scale of computing power can be basically predicted, and the electricity cost of graphics cards is fixed. The only variable is the cost of the mining machine. As long as the cost of the mining machine is well controlled and the coin price remains above 10U, then the first mine is a sure profit.
The above is our assessment of the factors that affect the profits from participating in the Aleo first mine. If you have any questions about the Aleo project or other mining-related issues, you can also scan the QR code to join my community and discuss the best mining strategies with your friends in the group.
