The Chinese authorities intend to until the end of August to put an end to “illegal” activities of mining bitcoin in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous region. It is reported by CoinDesk.
The first rumors about the new plans of the authorities appeared this weekend after a leak in the network of documents of the Commission of economy and information technology of Xinjiang (EIC). In particular, they say that the local suppliers of electricity are obliged “to stop illegal mining of bitcoin”, and also to report it to the authorities.
Also in the official documents States that under the category of “illegal mining” means mining operations cryptocurrency without a license, as well as the use of electricity without a contract with its suppliers.
“Local utility companies and companies will be prosecuted if you fail to stop “illegal” mining operations”, — stated in the document EIC.
The publication notes that the Chinese authorities in January this year obliges the suppliers of electricity from Xinjiang province regularly report on the activities of local companies involved in mining bitcoin.
This decision greatly affected the operation of mining companies who operate in this region. So, Scott Meng, head of the canadian blockchain startup which is also engaged in mining in Xinjiang, said that the decisions taken by authorities of the PRC action “definitely had an impact” on local businesses.
“In this region I have two partners: one 18 000 miners, another 40 000. Lately, they are desperately calling for help and asking me to find a place for them in the U.S. or Canada,” — said Meng.
It is also worth noting that in June last year EIC appealed to local authorities to exercise caution when approving the activities of companies specializing in the production of bitcoin.
“These operations do not add to the region’s economy is nothing, and only cause a leap in consumption of electricity”, — stated in the documents of the EIC.
In the summer-autumn of 2017, many companies sought to maximize operating profit by location of the mining capacity in the Chinese regions with cheap electricity. So, in November of last year to Xinjiang province “watched” a world-leader in bitcoin mining Bitmain.
We will remind, recently it became known that Bitmain, Canaan Creative and Ebang went to the list of “unicorns” in greater China (China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan). The capitalization of each of the company far exceeded $1 billion.
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