I've only been around these parts for just under a week or so now, so it's very possible I'm missing something here. As an experiment, I started powering down, fully expecting to stop earning "interest" on my SP. To my surprise, even after the power down began, my SP happily continued ticking upwards.

Isn't this a loophole?

If you continue gaining interest while you power down, why not always be powering down? At the end of your 7 days, you just take your payout and analyze your options.

Please excuse my MS Paint skills:

Option #1: Sell your STEEM if you need liquidity for whatever reason.

Option #2: If SMD/STEEM price is greater than Open Market price, buy SMD and convert it to STEEM.

I understand you need to wait another 7 days to get the open market price for STEEM - and that you're taking a "risk" that the open market price is higher than the internal price at the end of 7 days. But that doesn't seem like as much of a risk now with the elimination of market maker rewards. The price of SMD/STEEM seems to have been constantly at a discount to the open market price since then.

Option #3: If neither of those options sound good at the time, you can just return it back into STEEM Power.

Sure, you may have temporarily lost minuscule fractions of STEEM Power depending on the length of time that you hold the converted STEEM in your account, but in my mind, this is more than made up for with the availability of the other 2 options above, which grant you either a.) liquid cash or b.) opportunities to profit from the disparities between the blockchain market and open market.

I'm probably missing something here. I haven't actually finished my first week of powering down, but found this aspect interesting and would welcome any insights.

Thank you!