Fellow Steemians,
@therealwolf here, founder & developer of Smartsteem.com
I'm writing to you today, to share some light on the current situation with STEEM.
Due to the recent STEEM USD price-fall, an edge-case scenario on the Steem blockchain had been activated and over time became more and more serious & prominent. Now, it's not too serious, but I feel it's important to talk about it, to prevent confusion
Problem: STEEM Price is lower than represented on the blockchain
For the technical versed people under you, feel free to read this post as well.
But in a nutshell, the following is currently happening:
There is too much SBD available and STEEM has not enough market-cap (fiat_value * supply), which results in multiple consequences.
#1 - Change in Payout (Less than 1% SBD)
All posts are currently being paid out to 99% in Steempower & Steem. Less than 1% of the reward is paid out in SBD.
Smartsteem.com is using the correct calculation, however, 95% of the other services are using an inaccurate one.
To change this, I've gone ahead and made a PR for the postpromoter-software, as it's the most popular one. So for everyone who is using it, make sure you update it! And just as a quick side-note: @smartsteem is using its own source-code.
#2 - STEEM price is artificially higher than it should be
When you look on CMC right now or on the exchanges, you'll see that Steem is currently worth around 27 cents. And even though witnesses are representing this value very accurately, the blockchain is artificially holding the value of Steem higher than it's supposed to be.
The 3.5 day average should be around 30 cents, but it is actually at 40 cents, due to the high SBD supply. (If you're interested about this topic, please read this post).
Generally, this is not a problem, however, it becomes one for those wanting to promote posts by paying with STEEM & SBD.
All services (incl. us) have to take the external exchange prices for calculing the value of the transfer, and until now, we also took the internal price for the calculation of the vote-values.
Which resulted in a negative/neutral profit, due to the nature of the external price being incredible lower than the internal one.
What does this mean?
A few promotion-service operators (@themarkymark buildawhale, @transisto promobot & @yabapmatt postpromoter/steembottracker), including myself representing Smartsteem.com, came up with a plan to temporary fix the situation.
So what this means is that from now on, we're going to take the exchange prices or better yet, the real 3.5 median price for calculation of the vote-values.
The result of this is, that you're going to see lower values on Smartsteem.com & Steembottracker than on Steemit.com, Steempeak, Steemworld.org & co - but the important part is: they are correct and you're not losing money.
As an example the difference of vote-value of @smartsteem:
when calculating it with the internal price of ~40 cents =>
81$when calculating it with the real average price of ~30 cents =>
64$.
[DEV] Calculating Real 3.5 Median Price
For developers, feel free to use the code below. It will get the 3.5 median average price.
const calculate_witness_median_price = async () => {
try {
let history = await client.call('condenser_api', 'get_feed_history') // this uses dsteem's client
history = history.price_history.map(x => parseFloat(x.base.replace(' SBD', '')) / parseFloat(x.quote.replace(' STEEM', '')))
return parseFloat(((history[history.length / 2 - 1] + history[history.length / 2]) / 2).toFixed(3))
} catch (error) {
console.error(error)
}
}
Ending Words
Now I understand that for many of you, all of this is a lot. But I just wanted to personally address this situation and let you know that we've taken care of it.
Don't be surprised if you see lower vote-values on your dashboard, than actually on the blockchain. You still received the correct votes.
But if there are any questions, please let me/us know in the comments below or on our discord channel.
With that said:
Keep on being positive! The bear-market will not last forever. Instead keep on accumulating and earning sweet STEEM!
Sincerely,
@therealwolf
Founder & Developer of Smartsteem.com
PS: Christmas is coming and maybe, just maybe, the Smart Santa got something for you.. :)
More about Smartsteem
- Introducing Smartsteem 2.0
- Smart Monsters - The smartest way to buy Steem Monsters Booster Packs & Starter Sets
- Join us on Discord
I really appreciate your positive leadership man, you addressing the problem and providing a solution prove that you only have the well being of the ecosystem as a top priority. These are really tough times, those who claimed to be here for the long haul will be tested and I hope that through hard work we will raise victorious from this challenge.
One thing still concerns me, why does this happen? Why the blockchain shows a price 33% higher than the one it shold reflect? I think that clarifing all these little details is the key to recover user's confidence on the platform... as I see it, having a overvaluated steem prevents users from massively converting SBD to Steem, this might help keeping Steem price's nose just above of the water, but at the same time it sinks SBD peg and (imo) it also sinks investor's trust into the platform. Please correct me if I'm wrong, when I read the Steem Whitepaper I though that SBD will guarantee you 1$ worth of Steem through the conversion function. I arrived to the platform this year, but I know that holding SBD will grant you some interest when SBD's price is below 1$ (which is the case right now).
When I read all those guarantees I thought that investors will be confidence to drive their capital here because the system was designed to inecntivize those who hold. The bear market is a great opportunity to test these two mechanisms, so far I can't say they performance was up to my expectations. It will really be reassuring to understand why current flaws do occur in order to start thinking solutions, if you just don't understand the problem it is impossible to contribute to the solution. Therefore, why the blokchain is overvaluating Steem? Who is the one that establishes the blockchain steem price if top 20 witnesses' feed price is the real one? Why interest for those who hold Steem tokens have not been activated since it is a mechanism that encourages holders? I am aware that witnesses have the cal to activate the interest when you lock some SBD, what is the general opinion that top witnesses have on this mechanism?
I'm not lossing my enthusiasm because of those unaswered questions, I know that the ecosystem is still pretty young and has a lot of room for growing, developing, and fixing it's inconsistencies. I really think that community have to take the lead and get back Steem to the road of success, we all have to contribute to that goal however we can.
I already went and wrote wall of text, sorry for that :)
Edited: I read the post from oflyhigh, I understand why does this happen... but still, I read all the HF20-related posts and none of them highlighted this code update... at least I understand a little bit more why is this happening and the solution is quite simple, Steem development cannot be on a bunch of hands, I think that if consulted this code change will never be allowed... it removes authority from witnesses and renders useless their price feed.
I sent @smartsteem 3 SBD 6 hours ago and I then received 1.179SBD from @smartsteem 6hours ago, but I haven't received a vote.
Can you check the details please?
https://steemit.com/film/@conformity/mother-died-special-edition-gut-wrenching-short-horror-film-hd-www-bloodycuts-co-uk
This is all correct, but may I suggest abandoning $ calculations and using STEEM as the native and base currency.
For those paying in STEEM, it is then a simple calculation to value the upvote and the amount needed from vote-sellers. The value of an upvote is based on the official blockchain price, however wrong it may be compared to external market prices.
I also think this is a good time to ditch the $-designated rewards and show them in STEEM. Then users will also see how stable upvotes have been in STEEM.
Thanks.
Lots of people have suggested doing away with the USD valuations on Steemit.com and showing them in STU's (Steem Internal Units.) That way, when the markets fluctuate, you will still see the true, unchanged value of your vote.
Though, this suggestion has been predictably unpopular for reasons you could likely guess. Most people, even those blogging on a cryptocurrency website, don't really care about the native token. They are still fiat-centric and want to know how many loaves of bread they can buy when their post pays out.
Clones like WeKu have implemented this change and it makes using the platform feel a lot smoother, so I'd certainly like to see it tried here, as "surface-level" as it may seem. Psychologically it's a significant difference.
What about an option to toggle "Native currency" or "Fiat currency" display in Settings? I think it would be quite nice to have that available.
the toggle may please both camps. Steempeak shows STUs.
I agree, it is a big psychological difference to see your earnings stable in the face of a changing exchange rate. I don't think it is a "surface level" change - it's like going abroad and always converting local prices into your native currency; once you live there, you stop doing that coz it stops making sense; you live, earn and spend locally.
That is, in many ways, steem's one good feature - a feature that then isn't... featured! Go figure :-)
That’s funny that you think anything could ever please both camps in 2018. They’ll both still find something to dislike. Disappointment is one thing at which we all still excel.
(I’m being sarcastic)
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More gallow's humour appreciated in these dark days. Unfortunately, the "sarc" tag is often needed to avoid triggering the over-sensitives.
@therealwolf I understand the different calculation however, what I do not understand is, if I send 1 steem here on steemit, I'm 1 steem out, yet if on an upvote you get back 0,95 steem, than I still loose money all the time. Even though it could be a correct price outside the platform, we are on the platform and therefore this still affects our vote-buying right?
??? What needs tobe fixed? Is there an error?
What do you mean with real median price?
The median price is 0.402 as of now. This is the real median price!!!
The blockchain is always leading. So how can you make something different for the median price?
This median price (0.402) is there with a reason. And now you guys (are going to fix) the reason?
This goes against the blockchain, ahh I understand, The Bot is of more importance, there must be revenue, ...
I am really very disappointed...
The issue people got worked up about is incorrect display in some UIs. Nothing on the blockchain is affected by the median being reported as an adjusted value, except that which is supposed to be affected.
Median Price is artificially inflated due to the SBD debt rate. You're paying with 26 cents STEEM but are getting 40 cents STEEM calculated on the blockchain, which would essentially lose you money, everytime - guaranteed.
But with the new changes, of taking the real median price (without the SBD debt limit), you're getting the correct ROI, and are not losing money.
You're welcome.
PS: Read this post: https://steemit.com/witness-category/@oflyhigh/why-is-medianhistoryprice-no-longer-the-median-of-feed-price-my-investigation
Ehhh, I am aware and I fully understand the median price mechanism and what impact it has to determine vote values. I was always under the impression that you used USD prices and not the median price feed.
I am just disappointed that it took you days, weeks to notice there was a change to the median price feed because of the SBD Debt Ratio hitting 10% ...
Positive thing is, it's now fixed for the future, it will not happen again.
Steem On!!!
How comes that this account has more profits than me:
https://steemit.com/@allasyummyfood/transfers
I have dedicated 40k SP but that above account only 24K SP why their profit is bigegr? Please provide me with fair answer?
Thanks
stay away from those scammers their upvotes are unprofitable they are stolen 32 steem so far from me with no refund the reason im blacklisted this is how they make money.
Today I did not get any rewards transfared to my account - wat does it mean - when will I get them????
Great solution, always appreciate you and your efforts in being the most fair and transparent.
Your transparency brings forward a nice and quality service we can all enjoy and watch grow, thank you for this post keep it up!
Fantastic concept and wonderful post. Thank you for sharing.
One other thing needs some serious thinking - serious re-thinking - the idea of capping SBD at 10% and at the same time implement the so-called "haircut". That algo is there to avoid the potentially catastrophic scenario of having such a low STEEM value compared to SBD that the SBD-debt is higher than the market cap of STEEM. We are nowhere near that scenario and yet the ecosystem has triggered this algo.
Either move the SBD debt rate back down, or move the haircut-trigger up - either way do not have them triggered at the same time!
Also, there was nothing wrong with SBD at max 5% - it was a stable ecosystem that worked without SBD printing. Now we are in a worse scenario.
Thoughts appreciated.
I fully agree. We're currently in this mess because some people thought it was a good idea to print millions of SBD, to counter a good thing: a pump.
Supply went from 3 Million to 16 Million. If the supply would still be at 3 Million, the peg would have hold easily on the downside.
But now we're at the point where converting SBD to STEEM is risky and actually bad for STEEM (due to the inflation). Reducing the haircut rule wouldn't be good in my opinion as it could very well increase the STEEM supply by a lot.
Thanks! Yes, messing with the rules now needs to be done with care - a care that was not taken when cheering an SBD supply hike.
I have been thinking about any solution and the sad thing is that there is nothing anybody can do within the ecosystem to change its current blockage. It requires external changes, such as a drastic change in the steem/sbd price.
When that happens, I suggest reversing that 10% debt level or at least putting some distance between the debt ceiling and the haircut level (the tonsure!)
Indeed, if the haircut level were to be increased just 1% now, it may unlock the system. SBD print rate would still be 1% (or zero) so it wouldn't be able to run up that 1% in coins, although it could do in price. Just thinking aloud, perhaps just to show that tweaks are not currently going to be effective.
On the upside, earnings in STEEM are edging upwards :-)
When the steem price stabilised and get at 0.402 cents then the SBD PEG will be restored.
The current haircut median price will slowly come down, as it has from 0.417 when we started it is 0.402 as of today.
Bots are a total different game ... they can choose as they wish...
If you are waiting for market conditions, then it is not a peg.
There is no peg; it's just an idea without mechanisms to implement it.
Stop wishful thinking about what should be, use reasoning about what is.
The peg is not an idea, it's the outcome of a calculation. What we are witnessing now is exactly the peg mechanism at work.
115322866.353 / 286962591.735 = 0.402
It isn't a price peg mechanism; it is to avoid the SBD debt ratio rising, potentially to be greater than the STEEM market cap.
So, what would happen if prices were x10 - STEEM at $2, SBD at $6?
This makes no sense. Although you posted it a while ago so maybe you were confused at the time, and already by now understand the situation better.
The supply went from 3 million to 16 million precisely due to the pump that you claim is a good thing. No one "thought it was a good idea to print millions of SBD to counter a ... pump", the system did that entirely by itself automatically as a direct consequence of the pump and of the long-existing (since 2016) rules and economics.
The change after HF20 to increase the print rate cap made very little difference to this; well under a million SBD was printed. Printing, as currently set up (both before and after HF20) is an exceedingly slow process. It takes about a year to move the debt ratio about 2% through printing. Indeed HF20 had not been implemented, and if nothing else had changed (a somewhat implausible scenario, but this assumption maximizes the possible impact), the supply of SBD would still be about where it is now, which is to say something above 12 million (maybe right around 12 million instead of the current actual 12.5 million), the debt ratio would still be >10% and the haircut rule described and its side effects described in the post would still be happening.
The only way to imagine supply at (or anywhere near) 3 million as you suggested would be if the original pump never happened.
What you've done here is make a compelling argument how that sort of extreme pump in SBD are not a "good thing" and are quite disruptive. That was not fully appreciated in 2016 which is why the system doesn't handle it well and also why renewed emphasis has been put onto improving the ability of the system to respond to these sorts of pumps.
Thanks for the comment. Very much appreciate it.
I fully agree that the root-cause was the pump. If that wouldn't have happened, SBD wouldn't have been massively printed in the first place.
However, my concern was and is with the decision by some witnesses to alter the pricefeed with a positive bias.
Let me quote a part of your highly valuable comment from 11 months ago:
https://steemit.com/witness-category/@reggaemuffin/witness-discussion-sbd-price-and-reverse-peg#@smooth/re-ats-david-re-reggaemuffin-witness-discussion-sbd-price-and-reverse-peg-20180124t044257100z
Maybe I'm wrong there, but isn't that also a reason, that we've printed more SBD due to the positive bias on pricefeeds?
I'm not sure how much influence this had, since not all witnesses decided to do this, but based on these posts (one from 9 months ago and the other from 6 months ago) at least 2 TOP 20 witnesses (at the time) had a positive bias.
6 months: https://steemit.com/witness-category/@dragosroua/adjusting-my-price-feed-bias-again-sbd-is-creeping-out-from-the-safe-zone
9 months: https://steemit.com/witness-category/@dragosroua/adjusting-my-price-feed-bias-down-to-50-from-250
And this is exactly what I was referring to. It's probably not as big of a deal in terms of influencing the SBD printing percentage as it has been due to the pump alone, but it's still a misdecision of witnesses in my book. (Let me quote @clayop's post here - https://steemit.com/witness/@clayop/three-reasons-why-we-should-not-support-feed-premium):
Ah yes I agree. However, not enough witnesses did that to make any appreciable difference.
Remember, the blockchain takes the MEDIAN of the witness values (middle values after sorting), so only two witnesses making the adjustment wouldn't do much if anything. The biased values all will end up at one end of the sorted list and not be used. (The purpose of using the median is to discard outlier or inaccurate values that are submitted for various reasons including, as in this case, non-consensus policy opinions, as well as malfunctions, delayed updates, etc.)
Yes - I thought it was more, but 2 of 21 is really not that much. Appreciate the conversation :)
Congratulations @smartsteem!
Your post was mentioned in the Steem Hit Parade in the following category:
I'm very glad to see this being addressed. I just wrote an article about it a couple of days ago.
https://steemit.com/busy/@jeezzle/the-truth-about-bidbots
I lost about 16 Steem on this post. https://steemit.com/busy/@jeezzle/the-dark-crystal-even-better-than-you-remember
That had been upped by 154 Steem.
By my calculations I should have actually made 50 Steem.
If you read that post you will see that I made the decision to never promote a large post again because it simply isn't worth it. I did also come to conclusion that the calculations for Steem at the time of the original post would have been listing at $0.40 even though I took several snapshots of the actual prices for everyday and included them in that post and you can see that they are all between $0.34 and $0.30. So where did it pulled out $0.40 from? It seems like it simply pulled it out of thin air in order to screw us.
You didn't lose any STEEM. The correct amount of STEEM was paid out but some of the UIs displayed it incorrectly.
If that's the case then all of the bidbots were serious miscalculating the information about the ROI.
The ones that I used promise a no more than negative 10% ROI, worst case.
10% of 154 is. 15.4
I lost 16.
Additionally, I received upvotes on that post from several accounts in the amount of at least 10 Steem, making the ROI way off base. Assuming what you have said is the absolute truth. then a significant error occurred somewhere along the line.
I've been posting on Steemit everyday since 2016. I never lost as much as I have the few times that I used Bidbots during this particular time period. It was enough to put me right off them. People say it just has to do with the way that amounts are displayed but spending 154 Steem and getting 138 back after spending about two hours making a post which would have made a few dollars on it's own without a Bidbot..... it's basically made a situation which I will never again advocate their use. Too big of a loss. All based on UI? I guess you know more about it than I would, but as someone that has been here for a couple of years posting every single day I'd say that making loss like that is completely outside the scope of my routine. It won't happen again.
Yes I agree the bidbots may have been getting it wrong. Those are not part of the blockchain, but it is still unfortunate that they were (are?) malfunctioning.
Very nice
Sounds good. 👌
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Regards @smartsteem
I've sent you this link https://steemit.com/dtubedaily/@luciannagy/txynz048 for upvote and nothing appear yet ... hope everything is fine. Regards
I wonder how many people on Steemit understand all the above in your article.
I did not understand much. All I know is that I pay in STEEM and in return am rewarded in STEEM and SP (and if I change STEEM to SP I get one for one, so I presume they have the same value.
A recent example (today):
For a post I paid Steem 0.650
I had returned 0.181
So it cost me Steem 0.469
I was paid Steem 0.099 and SP 0.099 giving me a total of 0.18 return for the 0.469 I paid.
However anyone theorises the situation, all I know is that I threw away Steem and am worse off for buying from Smartmarket.
If I am wrong...I sure would like to know where I am wrong, what mistake I am making.
You aint' wrong, the greedy bastards just love money now more than successful steem forever.
Regarding my earlier comment:
It was obviously not about the money; the loss in US $ is about 8cents...I would not bend down to pick it up if I dropped coins to that value.
It is the principle of the thing and a need to know for the future, since I have been using smartmarket for a while and had hoped to continue.
The fact that you do not feel I deserve the courtesy of a reply (as happened with a previous communication of mine) shows that you do not think anyone who is not a whale worth wasting your time on - or do you do the same to everyone?
Well, now I know that I must never vote for you as a witness, since that is exactly the kind of person I would never vote for and I am also now compelled to stop using your service.
Congratulations @smartsteem! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :
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STOPHi @smartsteem, thanks for the post. I have one question that I am not is related to this. For the past week, my balance at smartsteem has remained at zero. However, I see that I sold some votes, since they appear in my transaction history.
Can you look into this?
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STOPHi SmartSteem. I sent a small bid yesterday but can't received an upvote from SmartSteem yet. Does it take more than 8 hours?
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To @smartsteem / @therealwolf, I apologize in advance if there is a better way to communicate with you. Not finding any means to do so on your SmartSteem website, I have come to the most recent post you have to leave this comment.
As the transaction listed below (from SteemWorld) illustrates / documents, this morning I sent you 10 SBD for promotion of my celebration post on recently becoming a dolphin - Starting the New Year as a Dolphin!
I have yet to receive anything. This is not the first time I have used your SmartSteem service. All previous times have worked just fine. Typically, once executed, the promotion upvotes begin appearing in ~ 15 min. It has now been almost 6 hours, so I assume something has gone wrong.
Please advise.
If there is some other way to get better info to you, please let me know. Thank you, in advance, for your prompt response to my inquiry.
Until I hear back from you then, here’s best wishes for a ...
💥 Happy New Year!! 💥
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STOPDo not miss the last post from @steemitboard:
Great post 👌👌
Hello, @smartsteem, why has this post not been updated before
Please upvote
https://steemit.com/photography/@kabil/fresh-fruit
I powered up and I received the following (only part of memo is quoted)
I have mentioned it before that I cannot visit the smartsteem.com site as Firefox refuses to open it, claiming it is not safe.
You took the attitude I must change what I use, that it is not a problem you should solve.
It certainly does not encourage me to invest in your accounts.
I sent 6 steem to smartsteem to promote my post and never got any votes...
Hello. I sent 0.57 dollars, but did not specify the phrase memo. Can I send money back? thank
Hello how are you sorry to bother you I'm new and I almost do not know how it works steemit could you help me
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Hello @smartsteem! This is a friendly reminder that you have 3000 Partiko Points unclaimed in your Partiko account!
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Not received any upvote Transfer 0.1 SBD
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Hi ,
Not received any upvote Transfer 0.1 steem
Thanks
🌷
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