Beijing’s broadening ban on cryptocurrency mining has—for now—crippled the industry and sent bitcoin prices tumbling.
But as bitcoin miners move to other regions and countries, China’s recent action may usher in a period of greater stability for the cryptocurrency. More diverse distribution of mining power and higher usage of renewable energy might also be in store.
In late May, China’s State Council vowed to crack down on bitcoin trading and mining. The notices came after China’s central bank began implementing its own digital currency.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) deems cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin a nuisance, disrupting economic order and facilitating illegal transfers of wealth. In addition, Beijing has decried the massive power consumption of bitcoin miners.
Following the CCP’s call, several provinces and territories, including Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and Sichuan, have begun enforcement measures to shut down mining operations.
That sent bitcoin prices plunging below $30,000 the week of June 14, after hitting all-time highs above $60,000 in April.
Why the decline? The CCP’s ban on mining has disrupted the computing power available to maintain and update the bitcoin blockchain.
Unlike mining operations of minerals such as gold and iron, bitcoin mining doesn’t involve hulking equipment. Bitcoin miners utilize warehouses of computers to solve computational problems to verify transactions, update, and maintain the bitcoin blockchain. In effect, the miners keep the bitcoin blockchain updated and in turn, are compensated with new blocks of bitcoin.
Since China’s ban took place, bitcoin’s hash rate—the computational power available to mine the cryptocurrency, which is a reflection of the efficiency of the bitcoin blockchain network—has dropped by nearly 50 percent over the past month, according to data from cryptocurrency firm The Block. Xinjiang and Sichuan provinces alone are thought to have contributed to 30 percent of total mining power.
This is definitely a near-term headwind for the industry. But China’s crackdown could be a long-term net positive development for the cryptocurrency industry.
For one, neither China’s ban nor the subsequent collapse in hash rates should be surprising. In fact, it’s shocking that so much bitcoin mining power was concentrated in China to begin with.
The CCP has been battling cryptocurrencies for almost a decade. In 2013, Beijing barred all financial institutions from handling cryptocurrencies. China then banned all initial coin offerings in 2017. By mid-2019, the People’s Bank of China blocked access to all domestic and foreign cryptocurrency exchanges to snuff out trading activity.
While the CCP stopped short of declaring ownership of cryptocurrencies illegal, it had in effect banned all forms of trading and exchange, including barring domestic financial institutions from exchanging digital currencies with the yuan. Those actions were mostly centered around limiting wealth transfer, but the CCP’s intent has been clear since 2013.
So what does this mean for bitcoin and bitcoin mining? In the near term, with bitcoin mining capacity decreasing due to the CCP’s crackdown, bitcoin mining becomes much more lucrative.
“As more hashrate falls off the network, difficulty will adjust downwards, and the hashrate that remains active on the network will receive more for their proportional share of the mining rewards,” Kevin Zhang, vice president of crypto mining equipment company The Foundry, said in a recent CNBC interview. In other words, the incremental “reward” for mining bitcoins is higher when there are fewer miners.
But there are other longer-term positives.
Less geographic concentration promises to make the bitcoin blockchain less vulnerable to the whims and regulations of a single country. Many Chinese mining operations have shipped their equipment abroad, with the United States and Kazakhstan as net beneficiaries.
For example, the Shenzhen-based and NYSE-listed BIT Mining has shipped most of its mining equipment outside China, according to a statement from the company. Approximately 320 mining machines were delivered to a facility in Kazakhstan, and the company said its operations should be back online by June 27.
A large portion of mining is expected to shift to the United States. CNBC’s Eunice Yoon wrote on Twitter on June 21 that a Guangzhou-based logistics firm was transporting 6,600 pounds of bitcoin mining computers destined for Maryland.
Another potential beneficiary is the state of Texas, which also happens to have some of the United States’ most pro-bitcoin politicians. Texas has some of the country’s lowest energy prices and a growing share of renewable energy sources.
Energy diversification is key. Relocating bitcoin hash rates from China to the United States—which has a much more diversified energy supply—would improve bitcoin mining’s carbon footprint, a key criticism of the cryptocurrency.
Tesla founder and CEO Elon Musk announced that Tesla would no longer accept bitcoin until its hash rates reached 50 percent from clean energy sources. Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren has also spoken out against bitcoin for its energy usage and resulting impact on the environment.
While longer-term viability of cryptocurrencies and bitcoin is still up in the air, moving mining capacity outside of China is at least a tangible first step in addressing those concerns and criticisms.
