Being Skeptical: Can you make $$$ mining bitcoins? (2017 edition)

With Bitcoin around 8000, people are once again excited about mining Bitcoins. But does it make sense for YOU to order a mining rig and start mining yourself?

Frankly, no, unless you live in an area with extremely cheap electricity.

You can play with the profitability calculator.  http://www.bitcoinx.com/profit/

Remember to plug in the cost of the rig (assume Antminer S9 cost $2000, 1600W, produces 14 TH/s), and cost of your local electricity (assume $0.13/W), AND the current BTC/USD conversion (use $8000)

Even at the current prices of $8000 USD/BTC, you won't break even for 5 MONTHS (breakeven is calculated for 140-160 days depending on electricity costs). The ONLY way this can be profitable is you setup where electricity is cheap, like in India and China, where electricity is 1/3 less than in the US.

Even "Hedge Fund of the Year" Got Tricked By Ticket Ponzi Scheme

A sports talk show radio host claims he has access to an almost unlimited amount of discounted major sports tickets, and he needed a lot of money to buy them in order to share the profits. Do you believe him?

A "hedge fund of the year" with 18 billion assets did, and it appears they have lost $4.3 million they put into two companies controlled by this talk show radio host.

You may think who'd believe this sort of stuff, or how can they be this stupid, but really, think about it...

Hedge funds, esp. fund of the year are NOT stupid.

However, there's no doubt that this is a ponzi scheme... When the Feds arrested the radio talk show host and uncovered a trove of communications between him and his co-conspirators, as well as evidence of his millions in gambling debt.  Robbing Peter to pay Paul is the very definition of Ponzi scheme. This radio talk show host, who co-hosts with a VERY famous former NFL celebrity, had been accused with running this scheme.

Yet you can see this sort of argument proliferate in the "make money fast" market, and promoters use the language of "this can't possibly be a scam because it associated with _____", and this guy has it in spades. A famous hedge fund gave him millions of dollars. He co-hosts a show with a celebrity. He can't possibly be a scammer, right?

WRONG!

Lesson to take away: when someone tries to sell you something on reputation only, think VERY VERY HARD on it. The risk is probably much higher than you think.

The Worst Kind of Scammer: False Claim of Government License by Options Rider

Ever heard of "Options Rider"? No? Me Neither, that is, until they started announcing absolutely bull****. But let's start from the beginning.

Back on April 16th, a review of Options Rider appeared on BehindMLM. The company purports to be offering option trading out of New Zealand, but the address is that of a Regus virtual office. And no owners were identified on their website. Shady enough? Searching the interwebs revealed two names: Bob Roberts and Thomas Carter.

Bob Roberts appears to be associated with another virtual entity called BancdeOptions, supposedly HQ'ed in Hong Kong, but it's another virtual office.

Here's the really hilarious part though... At the time of BehindMLM's review (early April 2015) Options Rider showed a license number:  FSP license number 207/13

Sometime after that review, they changed it to FSP license number FSP109805.

But I was able to locate a version of the Options Rider contract, on "WV Trading" that PREDATES the both of them that says: "CIF License number 207/13"

The Company is authorized and regulated by the New Zealand Securities and Exchange Commission to offer certain Investment and Ancillary Services and Activities under the Provision of Investment Services, the Exercise of Investment Activities, the Operation of Regulated Markets and Other Related Matters Law of 2007, Law 144(I)/2007, as subsequently amended or replaced from time to time (“the Law”), with CIF license number 207/13.

The problem is New Zealand does NOT have a Securities and Exchange Commission. New Zealand investments is regulated by Financial Markets Authority. And the cited laws do NOT exist in New Zealand. And obviously, "CIF" number is meaningless in New Zealand. In NZ financial entities are licensed as FSP (Financial Service Providers), but its relevance will become clearer. There is no "Options - anything" licensed as FSP in New Zealand. Search the database yourself.

In fact, you should notice that by typing in a few test cases that NONE of the FSP number goes above 5 digits. Thus, the 6-digit number given by Options Rider is BOGUS.

By now it should be clear that this company is a scam, citing license by a nonexistent government agency for legitimacy. But wait, there's even more hilarity in the lies of Options Rider!