On May 11, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) issued a subpoena against Bitcoin mining company Marathon Digital. According to reports, the subpoena was filed on April 10, 2023.
Marathon Digital later said that it was cooperating with the SEC, “the SEC may be investigating for any violations of federal securities laws,” the company said.
The mining company added that the SEC’s subpoena may be related to their 100 megawatt data center in Hardin, Montana.
This is not the first subpoena Marathon Digital has received from the SEC. The company also received an SEC subpoena at the end of the third quarter of 2021, in which the SEC required the company to turn over certain documents and information related to its mining operations.
Recently, on May 9, Marathon Digital announced a partnership with Zero Two to build a large-scale Bitcoin mining facility in Abu Dhabi . The project will include two mining facilities with a total capacity of 250 megawatts.
The Abu Dhabi mining project was announced shortly after the administration of US President Joe Biden proposed a new tax on crypto miners operating in the United States. The law will require these companies to pay a tax equal to 30% of the cost of electricity used while mining.
Is the SEC Against Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies?
It wouldn’t be fair to say that the SEC is against cryptocurrencies in general. However, the problem seems to be the lack of clear regulations in the United States. Without a consistent set of rules, every move seems to go against the entire industry.
Furthermore, the SEC and CFTC (Commodity Futures Trading Commission) both want to gain control of the cryptocurrency market.
Therefore, the fault lies in the lack of regulations and not in any one agency. With that said, however, the SEC and CFTC have to figure out what path they want to take for emerging asset classes like Bitcoin. Cryptocurrency companies and businesses should not leave the US because of the lack of clear rules.
Some experts predict that the United States will soon issue a new set of rules for cryptocurrencies.
