The Chinese government banned all types of Bitcoin mining, trading, advertising, and owning activities last year. The government of China cited power issues and adopted policies that promote a local CBDC in the country. The government took extensive preventive measures by criminalizing the act of holding or trading a cryptocurrency.

Furthermore, the state banned all cryptocurrency influencers in China and banned all crypto promotional ads on local social media applications. Despite the pains that the Chinese state took to discourage Bitcoin trading in the region, a new report published by Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, CCAF, suggests otherwise.

CCAF’s Report

CCAF report claims that China has started to emerge as one of the top Bitcoin mining contributors in the world once again. The CCAF report was also published and quoted by a local media outlet called South China Morning Post. The developers have traced a considerable amount of hashing traffic back to Chinese addresses. Careful estimates suggest that China once again accounts for 20% of the total mining traffic.

The ratio accounts for Bitcoin mining activities from September last year to January 2022. The statistics issued by the CCAF claim that Bitcoin miners in China have managed to remain online despite the government exodus. In August last year, the hash rate from China once again reached 22.3% coming in second place in the world after the 27.7% hash rate contribution of the USA.

Cambridge Bitcoin Electricity Consumption Index or CBECI is a measurement generated by CCAF that records and updates the geo-location data generated from all hash traffic for the Bitcoin network. The data is contributed and verified by the international mining pools. The analysts at CCAF claimed that Bitcoin miners run a strong syndicate of underground farms in China.

The report further suggests that such mining farms can remain functional due to the availability of off-grid power supply sources and miners taking the caution of running smaller units at a time. The report also claimed that Chinese miners are making use of Virtual Private Networks or VPNs to stay shielded from the detection of the government and regulatory agencies.

The laws of China might start to sway in favour of Bitcoin traders, and miners as a recent ruling from a Chinese high court acknowledged Bitcoin’s economic value and legal viability as an investment option.