Miami aims to attract Chinese bitcoin miners, but will they bite?

Miami aims to lure Chinese bitcoin miners into the state as they are looking for a safe environment for their mining operations due to the ban in China, as we reported in the latest Bitcoin newsletter.

BTC miners from China look for a new home while the government cracks down and the Mayor of Miami hopes to lure them to his bitcoin city, but he won’t be in power forever. Miami aims to attract them because of the cheap cost of electricity, as Chinese miners make up 65% of the network’s hash rate, but with the government promoting the industry, mining companies are considering leaving the country.

In Miami, Mayor Francis Suarez welcomed the persecuted Chinese miners and all those who are tired of towing computers from different parts of China and are threatened by government crackdown.

“The fact that we have nuclear power means that it is very cheap. We know how important that is […] Miners want to achieve a certain kilowatt hourly rate. And that’s why we’re working on it with them. “

Electricity per kilowatt hour costs 10.7 cents in Miami, 13.3 cents less than the national average, while the US government views nuclear power as a much more reliable source and one of the most environmentally friendly. Suarez promoted Miami as Bitcoin City and uploaded a BTC white paper to the city’s website, and a district commissioner hung the BTC-specific campus in front of an audience at the Bitcoin conference earlier this month.

Suarez’s offer has yet to convince Chinese BTC miners, and Max Hu of mining company Power360 says electricity prices in Miami are uncompetitive. Kazakhstan, for example, charges between $ 0.03 and $ 0.033 kWh, so running the fans to keep machines from burning in the sweltering heat of Miami would add to the cost, he said. Ben Gagnon, chief mining manager at Canadian BTC mining company Bitfarms, says Miami has several abandoned factories or military bases that miners in China have used and turned into farms. Wayne Lin, founder of Aixa8 Ventures who invested in BTC mining, believes these setbacks are not enough to rule out Miami:

“I wouldn’t want to spend millions building my base if the guidelines suddenly changed.”

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