China’s Macroeconomic Planning Agency Considers Ban On Crypto Mining
China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), a state planning agency who has the responsibility of spearheading macroeconomic policies, has revealed it is considering the elimination of crypto mining in the country.
The NDRC has reportedly now included crypto mining as part of its draft for a revised list of industrial activities the agency intends to curtail. The list which reportedly runs at over 450 points long identifies activities the state deems to be in violation of relevant laws and regulations or constitute a safety hazard.
It forms part of the NDRC’s wider Catalogue for Guiding Industry Restructuring, which has been issued since 2005 and determines which industries are to be fostered, restricted or eliminated in the country.
With the draft list reportedly open to public feedback since yesterday, April 8th, the NDRC has reportedly not set a proposed target date for eradicating crypto mining activities, stipulating instead that the industry should be phased out with immediate effect.
Ever since the People’s Bank of China (PBoC)’s historic ban on initial coin offerings (ICOs) in September 2017, China has made a series of moves to attempt to cut the country’s crypto mining titans down to size.
Because of the country’s abundance of cheap energy and hardware, reports in previous years had indicated that over two-thirds of global mining pools were based in China.