This weekly news aggregator from mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong seeks to curate the top industry news, including impactful projects, regulatory landscape changes, and integration.

Regulated noise

In this week’s column, The Man in Shanghai is determined to cram all regulatory fuss into one piece so as not to consume too much of your time. Let’s begin.

It’s not much, just a warning from the Hebei provincial government notification It will put an end to cryptocurrency mining in the region. This is primarily a story, not a story, as it is essentially a reformulation of a national policy that went into effect months ago. After all, Hebei has never been a mining stronghold, so this announcement is more procedural than anything else. Mining continues to move overseas, while China unites in an effort to be carbon neutral.

For reference, China has 23 provinces and nearly half have restored their commitment to national politics by announcing that cryptocurrency mining will not be accepted.

The Securities Times, a government publication, published an article warning the public about the NFT bubble. This Shenzhen-based publication challenged the real economic value of the NFT, an issue many of us have wondered. However, the suspicion hasn’t stopped the trend from spilling over into less mainstream art circles, where NFT and Metaverse-related events are becoming more common.

Selling shovels during the gold rush

While mining in China may be difficult, mining equipment production continues to be quite profitable. Canaan, one of the largest manufacturers of cryptocurrency mining hardware in the world, announced Highest quarterly profit so far. The company Financial quarter 2 shows the company had total net sales of more than $ 167.5 million. This is likely due to the sharp rise in prices this spring, which led to an active expansion of mining facilities around the world. The next round of quarterly financial reports will tell a more poignant story as investors learn how China’s persistent regulations have harmed the industry. Zhang Nangeng, President and CEO of Canaan said:

“We did a remarkable job in the second quarter of 2021. Despite unexpected regulatory dynamics and Bitcoin price volatility, we achieved record high results and delivered 5.9 million Thash / s of powerful computing power to our customers. “

Round up the trading floor

The volume on exchanges such as Huobi and OKEx is largely unchanged as in the last 12 weeks. The most recent surge came during the sell-off in early May when Chinese regulators began cracking down. During this time, FTX saw a dramatic increase in volume, suggesting that some Chinese users may be connecting to exchanges that are not the dominant players in the trading space.

FIL remains popular on Huobi, ranking in the top 5 on Thursday’s 24-hour volume chart. The token continues to enjoy huge popularity with traders in China, despite being around 50% below its all-time high compared to the beginning of this year. ADA, SOL and DOT are clearly visible assets in the OKEx volume diagram that reflect the global volume distribution. Speaking of Solana, Chinese users up Weibo reacted strongly to Wednesday’s shutdown of the network, with some criticizing the network’s decentralization. There have been discussions about whether Ethereum’s early technical issues are comparable to the event, which proves that Solana and Ethereum maxis will mismatch in any culture regardless of culture.

Free eCNY

The central bank digital currency created by the Chinese central bank is now moving forward with the popular Meituan app offering around $ 1.50 eCNY (digital yuan) to users who open a “digital wallet” and use its services.

Meituan is best known for its bright yellow food delivery service and shared bikes that can be found on most of the city’s streets. The campaign aims to promote a low-carbon life and is open to nine pilot cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Chengdu.

ECNY, originally positioned as an institutional remittance tool for commercial banks, is now being pushed to private customers. Currently, major brands such as McDonalds and Zara are displaying eCNY payment tags on sales counters across the country. The digital payments space is currently dominated by WeChat Pay and Alipay, but these two companies could struggle to control their market share if the central government is interested in tying eCNY to applications.

Ironically, Meituan plays a special role in China’s crypto-meme culture. Token holders often joke that if the market crashes they will be forced to make grocery deliveries, resulting in the following meme.

Late March, Meituan Disclosure it has about 570 million users. Other financial applications, including banking apps, have built wallet services into their products.