With the way everything is in a drop right now, mining has become more of an investment then as an instant profit. Most coins now cost more to mine then they are currently worth. So either you gamble that the coin will go up after some time or hold off for a while untill the market goes back up again, if it does that.
I never saw mining as a short term profit, I'm just doing it on the side with my gaming rig since I don't have time to play anymore, might as well try to make some money, also thought about selling my card since the price went up by 30% compared to the time I bought it.
But the point is you should mine something you think will increase in value.
So many people just look at short term gains and jump around mining what looks good right now (nicehash), this is good if you have a big farm, but smaller miners are better off with some gambling.
As someone already suggested, BTX is a good coin to mine right now, but somehow can't get my miner to run, not sure what is the exact problem.
It's nice to see these thoughts shared, because I see alot of "well now coin x is only mining $5 or $10 a day" or something depending on the coin / rig etc... , but if you steadily mine and have a little luck as people get into crypto currency more and more, couldn't we see some coins 3x, 5x, or 10x (over a longer time span, like 2-5 years?)
If you look at it this way, mining a coin that gets you only $5-10 a day, that 5x in 2 years, is like a $25-50 profit per day... right? Or maybe more if it is a coin that goes nuts and goes up 10x or 100x? That's the way I'm looking at it at this point.
If you look at that in that way, it is better to just buy the coins directly.
I've definitely heard that argument you might be right ... Mining has the initial hardware costs, plus power all year, etc... plus difficulty and block reward decreases... There's really too many variables over the course of years, but in my overly simplified math example (with tons of missing variables i'm sure), I think an argument could be made that at a certain increase in cost , mining becomes more profitable:
(let me know if I'm wrong, I'm wanting to learn and share like most everyone else here) :
-BUY/HOLD -Buy $4200 of a coin at $0.5 each, if cost per coin doesn't change I own $4200 of coin*in 1 year at 3x cost it's $12,600 I hold ,
*in 1 year if it 5x cost it's $21,000 I hold,
*and if it's 10x cost it's $42000. Solid.
-MINE- Spending $4200 ($2400 piece of hardware, plus $1800 in power for 1 yr /$150 a month) , and the average of coins mined daily over the year is 30 coins a day...*in 1 year at same cost I've mined $5475 (30 coins a day, $0.5 each coin) minus cost of hardware and power = $1275 , not good
*in 1 year at 3x , mined total $16,425 - $4200 hardware / power = $12,225 , closer to buy / hold scenario
*in 1 year at 5x , mined total is $27,375 - $4200 hardware / power = $23,175 , better than buy / hold
*in 1 year at 10x, mined total is $54,750 - $4200 "" = $50,550 , $7450 more than just buy/hold
Check it out, let me know what I missed, (of course I know it can't be that simple, but I think the basic logic applies)