The Chinese version of Twitter, popularly called Weibo, has resumed its streak of banning crypto-related accounts as it purges over 12 accounts affiliated with cryptocurrencies over the weekend.
A report by South China Morning Post stated that Weibo removed 12 popular crypto accounts.
“At least a dozen popular Weibo users who post content about cryptocurrencies found themselves unable to use their accounts on Saturday night. Other users who attempted to access those pages were greeted with a message saying the accounts had violated Weibo guidelines and “relevant laws and regulations”.”
As this is not the first time Weibo would stage a crackdown on cryptocurrency-related accounts on its platform, some of those affected were not surprised at the Chinese language microblogging website’s latest move. One of the affected accounts posted with another account saying:
“The account I’ve been using for years is suddenly gone,” one of the banned users posted to the platform under a new account called Professor Hash. “But I’m OK with it. The day was going to come sooner or later.”
As China officially frowns at cryptocurrency-related activities within its borders, Weibo periodically purges itself off crypto accounts to comply with China’s regulations. In 2019, Weibo banned the account of high profile crypto personalities like Justin Sun of Tron and Yi He, Binance co-founder. It even suspended the accounts of Asia’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges, Binance, Huobi and OKEx, in March this year.
Recall that China has announced a crackdown of cryptocurrency activities in May, specifically targeting miners within its shores, which many attributed as the reason for the horrific market selloffs, wiping off more than $1 trillion in cryptocurrency’s overall market cap. Weibo’s current dozen account ban may be another strong signal from Beijing that it’s not backing down on its stance of being opposed to crypto activities.
Amidst Weibo crackdown, China issues a sweeping of bitcoin mining operations within its territories
Meanwhile, Bitcoin mining companies domiciled in China, who account for at least two-thirds of the global mining activity, are looking to relocate to North America or Central Asia, with a few of them going underground. Provinces like Mongolia, Xinjiang and Sichuan, which used to be a cheap source of electricity for bitcoin miners, are beginning to comply with Beijing’s orders. Inner Mongolia was the first to issue a cease and desist order to miners with Sichuan and Xinjiang expected to follow suit. Bitcoin mining ban for miners in these Chinese regions comes at such a time when electricity tariff is extremely cheap. The abundant rain supply at this season as Xinjiang and Sichuan’s bitcoin mining energy comes from hydroelectric; a renewable source of energy not particularly harmful to the environment. For context, Chinese province Xinjiang alone accounts for nearly 36 per cent of the global bitcoin hash rate. This was confirmed by Cambridge University’s Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index. Sichuan and Inner Mongolia, on the other hand, come in second and third, respectively, giving China a 65 per cent share of the global hash rate.