If AMD/Intel went in I would like to see for myself their chips capabilities before buying, making the firmware is well within their capabilities but of course would need to see how they run.
That said even if AMD/Intel came in I still think Klondike firmware would hold its own by the time they make that choice unless they adopt it themselves but it would be interesting to see how the market reacts to that type of news.
Asicminer would need to adjust its game
I would like to believe AM has a shot, but we're talking David vs. Goliath. It would take a month for either to catch up to AM, then another month to leapfrog over them via the hordes of PHDs on payroll eager to produce new designs and get them produced right away: the meager advantage AM has over Bitcoin chipmakers/miners currently is irrelevant to the mastodons of the real world. Best case they enter the game very late and by then AM has established itself as a viable company (tour de force already - overtaking legal, scaling, R&D...) able to work the niche and maintain some HW resale that chipmakers don't care for, Divs exist but are very small.
You have a point about the potential risks but the number of bitcoins in circulation shouldn't have any bearing on the potential valuation of a company. The total value of an economy isn't just the money in that economy but all of the goods you can buy or trade with it, including financial instruments such as debt. A higher valuation of ASICMINER adds to the total value of the bitcoin economy.
I'm struggling with the concept - if AM's valuation is disconnected from the currency and it's core functionality is the verification of transactions, then how is it different from the Federal Reserve / Quantitative Easing? That would be artificially devaluating the currency.
I can understand the concept but I struggle to imagine it - in my head we're working a zero-sum world, there cannot be more valuation than the total worth of all the currency available.
First movers do have the advantage but your right in that case it is AM's game to lose of course adaptability is important. But AM does have cheap production in China that said the competition if they were sharks could just outbid their manufacturers and raise their costs till they are unprofitable then it becomes a battle of mobility. The only way to counter that is to own the means of production aka factories by controlling capacity and their supply chain management then they can handle the big dogs instead of being manipulated by their competitors.
Going into economy now he-he
Expanding that into real market economy the variations of exchange demand determine the market price
Basically hoarding is equal to saving and saving will be used to promote growth simply put the economy moves itself based on true profits to be had vs holding
I'll just refer to here explanations are sound
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Deflationary_spiralhttps://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Controlled_supplyBecause the monetary base of bitcoins cannot be expanded, the currency would be subject to severe deflation if it becomes widely used. Keynesian economists argue that deflation is bad for an economy because it incentivises individuals and businesses to save money rather than invest in businesses and create jobs.
The Austrian school of thought counters this criticism, claiming that as deflation occurs in all stages of production, entrepreneurs who invest benefit from it. As a result, profit ratios tend to stay the same and only their magnitudes change. In other words, in a deflationary environment, goods and services decrease in price, but at the same time the cost for the production of these goods and services tend to decrease proportionally, effectively not affecting profits. Price deflation encourages an increase in hoarding — hence savings — which in turn tends to lower interest rates and increase the incentive for entrepreneurs to invest in projects of longer term.
Asicminer by distributing its dividends to all shareholders acts as a faucet to the community if I went simple on it of course its more technical than that but one could view it that way.
The magnitude of investment changes but profit is the same people need savings to build a business, and entrepreneurs need capital to start a business hoarding/saving helps to provide the capital to make the real economy grow.
By having a diverse set of shareholders receiving dividends the capital distributes itself efficiently between individuals to promote growth in the economy of bitcoin otherwise it is held.
Whatever makes the most effective profit
Another point of note is that if bitcoin ever gets replaced and another protocol is adopted that uses mining.
ASIC has the ability to build units for their systems and has hard assets to do so.
If I recall correctly though Friedcat said that if they ever do that another company would be created and the risk would be different Asic shareholders would not need to take that risk unless they invested in the new company. Anyways leaves this for discussion
PS: Waits for Divs too he-he