Photo by Elio Santos on Unsplash
The Helium Network started the year 2022 with approximately 450,000 hotspots and ended the year with roughly 980,000 hotspots in 187 countries and 76,000 cities.
The Helium Network is a decentralized wireless Internet of Things ( IOT ) using the LoRaWAN protocol to create a long range wireless network. Nodes ( miners ) on the network are individuals who operate Helium hotspots in their homes or place of business and are rewarded in the HNT token for their participation in the network.
While more miners are being added to the network every day rewards are being reduced over time. From genesis HNT was being mined at a reward rate of 5M HNT per month. In August 2021 the reward rate was reduced to 2.5M HNT per month and another halving will occur in August 2023 when rewards will again be cut in half to 1.25M HNT per month.
Ultimately halving reduces the issuance rate of new coins by cutting down on the block reward provided to miners. This ensures that the amount of a coin in circulation does not increase exponentially, decreasing the supply being released and thus decreasing the rate of inflation for a cryptocurrencies value.
The entire cryptocurrency market has been mired in a bear market this year. The HNT token started 2022 above $40 and is currently trading around $1.60 at the time of writing.
So is it still profitable to operate a hotspot with an increased number of miners and decreasing rewards in addition to the HNT token trading at a depressed value ? The network daily average reward rate at time of writing is 0.10 HNT per day. The HNT token is currently at $ 1.60 which equates to about $ 0.16 per day or $ 59 per year.
One way to measure profitability is ROI ( return on investment ) or how many days it takes to recoup your upfront cost. In January 2022 you could expect to pay $1200 for a Helium miner and earn on average $4 a day and get your upfront cost back in less than a year.
In January 2023 you could expect to buy a new miner for about 1/10 the cost that you were able to a year ago. There are brand new miners on Ebay selling for roughly $110. At the current average earnings of $0.16 it would take approximately 700 days to recover your costs.
Based on ROI alone you can see that it’s not nearly as profitable as it was a year ago however we are in an extreme bear market right now . To be objective what are HNT price predictions for the future ?
Cryptonewsz.com predicts the HNT token to trade between $18 — $21 by the end of 2025. Many others predict a much higher token price but being a realist I would much prefer to use a more conservative estimate.
Mining at a rate of .10 HNT per day you could expect to mine 36 HNT over the course of the next year. In 2025 those tokens would be worth $648 using the $18 prediction. The all time high for the HNT token is $51 so it’s not unreasonable to believe the token price could recover a 1/3 of it’s value off the all time high if the Helium network keeps delivering on it’s promises.
Can you get rich mining HNT ? No, those days are over. Can you develop a passive stream of income from mining ? Absolutely !
I consider myself a hobbyist and my miner earns approximately .30 HNT per day as I have a better than average location . I continue to mine in a bear market because eventually the bear will become a bull market and crypto prices across the board will rise once again.
To summarize, I mine HNT not for the price of the token today but for what it could be in the future !
If you enjoyed this article regarding the Helium network please see my article from 2022. Thanks for reading !
https://medium.com/coinmonks/helium-network-is-it-still-profitable-to-mine-in-2022-603b675a1b39
