Editor's Note: This article comes fromStar Media STARMEDIA (ID: Star_Media1), Author: Xuesui, reproduced by Odaily with authorization.
Editor's Note: This article comes from
Star Media STARMEDIA (ID: Star_Media1)
, Author: Xuesui, reproduced by Odaily with authorization.
In 2019, runaways, rights protection, arrests, bankruptcy, unemployment, all affect the hearts of a group of people. And a series of measures by the regulators have dealt a devastating blow to them.
They are miners.
The virtual currency mining industry is relatively concentrated in Xinjiang, Sichuan, Inner Mongolia and other remote areas in the northwest, where resources are abundant and electricity prices are low. The first-generation mine master Bitmain has always regarded these areas as the core areas of mining layout. However, no one expected that when the country removed virtual currency mining from the ranks of backward production capacity, virtual currency mining still did not escape the palm of supervision.
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Regulatory pressure, miners struggle
Since mining steals civilian electricity and occupies civilian power resources, which greatly affects the electricity demand of the people, after receiving multiple reports and complaints, the government of Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture decided to take action to rectify virtual currency mining, December 24, 2019 , The government of Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture convened local mining companies to hold a symposium on the cleanup of Bitcoin mines.
As soon as the news came out, rumors spread everywhere, causing panic on a large scale. Because the mining input cost is not low, the cost of a bitcoin mining machine is about 6000-20000 yuan. And some mining pool miners invest hundreds of thousands, millions, and even tens of millions of dollars in mining.
With such a high investment, if the regulation adopts one-size-fits-all measures, the miners will lose everything.
When Star Media sorted out the list of participating companies this time, it discovered the mining giant Bitmain. Everyone knows that Bitmain is the largest mining machine manufacturer and Bitcoin mine in my country, and is the main source of miners' equipment. Star Media found that Fujian Zhanhua Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Zhanhua Intelligent) is an enterprise involved in the liquidation of mines in Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. Its actual controller is Bitmain, and it is also the backbone of Bitmain’s mining machine production.
According to the data from the enterprise search, less than a week before the symposium, Zhanhua Smart has been forcibly frozen by the Changle City People's Court for a period of 731 days.
As my country's virtual currency mining bully, once an accident occurs, it will directly affect the vital interests of tens of thousands of miners.
But in fact, supervision never stops.
These areas, which are regarded as paradise by virtual currency mining farms, have transparent air, and the number of days that the air index does not meet the standard in a year does not exceed 10 days, but mining will bring air pollution, excessive power resource consumption and pollutant emissions, which will make the environment The fragile western region has increased the level of air, water, etc. pollution.
In 2018, the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region requested a comprehensive rectification of the crazy bitcoin mining in the region, and many bitcoin mines were directly moved from Inner Mongolia to Sichuan, Xinjiang and other western regions.
Bitcoin mining hit its heyday in 2018, attracting national attention. On April 9, 2019, the National Development and Reform Commission issued the "Draft for Guidance on Industrial Structure", suggesting that virtual currency mining be included in the elimination of backward industries, but it was deleted half a year later. Despite this, various local governments have not slackened their supervision on virtual currency mining.
With the prevalence of mining, there are more and more mining modes, and many altcoin mining can be realized on ordinary home computers. Therefore, mining not only occurs in professional mining areas such as mines and pools, but also occurs in every household. . On December 24, 2019, the police in Tangshan City, Hebei Province and the power supply department conducted a comprehensive mining investigation on more than 70,000 households, factories, mines, and villages within the jurisdiction. As a result, nearly 7,000 mining equipment were seized, and 3 high-power Transformers and 790 bitcoin mining machines, 1906 bitcoin miners and more than 70 operators were arrested on suspicion of stealing electricity.
After that, Anhui and other regional governments also successively issued documents requiring illegal mining companies to withdraw and rectify. Under the centralized and high pressure of supervision in various places, the living space of miners is constantly shrinking.
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Shrinking market value hurts employees
The reason why miners chase virtual currency mining is because mining is one of the most profitable industries in the blockchain industry with a relatively small risk factor.
According to the list of "China's Top 500 Private Enterprises in 2019" released by the Hurun Research Institute, Bitmain ranked 246th with an estimated value of 30 billion yuan. In the rich list of the Hurun Report, Wu Jihan and Zhan Ketuan, the two founders of Bitmain, are listed at the top, not Zhao Changpeng or Li Lin as we imagined. One of the top three mining machine giants is Canaan Yunzhi. Although it did not enter the top 500, it was successfully listed on Nasdaq this year, and its market value has continued to decline. According to the public information of Jianan Zhizhi, the main business income in 2017 was 1.308 billion yuan.
According to the disclosed information, 98.46% of Canaan’s business revenue comes from mining machine sales, while 79.82% of its market share is in China.
At the beginning of the new year in 2020, the layoffs of mining bully Bitmain staged. Some employees said that "layoffs are not terrible, what is terrible is that there is no compensation". Bitmain, which has difficulties in revenue, is also very stingy with the compensation for layoffs. For this, the employees who were laid off near the end of the year were extremely dissatisfied, so they pulled up banners in Bitmain's office, formed a rights protection group, and demanded arbitration Settle supplementary compensation.
A source said that Bitmain’s layoffs accounted for 1/3 of the total number of employees, affecting about 400 employees. Not only did the domestic personnel decrease severely, but many foreign mines including Texas mines in the United States have been shut down. The decline in sales of mining machines and the long-term inability of the AI business to make a profit are the main reasons for the sharp drop in personnel.
But this is not the first large-scale layoff of Bitmain. As early as the end of 2018, in order to find a balance between revenue and cost, the company cut its employees from nearly 3,000 to about 1,300.
Bear market + supervision, a generation of miners who can’t even protect the interests of 1,300 employees, how can the worries of tens of thousands of miners be solved?
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Halving is approaching, life-saving straw?
"Bitcoin price rise and fall is the main factor that determines the survival of miners." The person in charge of a mine in China told Star Media.
In 2016, Bitcoin officially started the bull market. In December 2017, the price of Bitcoin was close to 20,000 US dollars. At that time, the supply of Bitcoin mining machines in the market was in short supply. For example, the price of a single unit once exceeded 20,000 RMB, and mining machine manufacturers, distributors, and mining owners at all levels made a lot of money.
In January 2018, the price of Bitcoin fell precipitously, and the price of mining machines also fell accordingly. The official website price of the same mining machine of the Ant series was less than 10,000 yuan, a drop of up to 50%. In order to reduce losses as much as possible, many mining machine holders reluctantly sell the mining machines purchased at high prices in the past by the catty, do garbage disposal, and leave the market by "cutting the meat".
