Freshwater Gang members Gao Qitang and Chen Yumin shot a bitcoin miner named Wu Nan when he failed to return their investment in his mining operation on time.
The shooting took place on April 14 in New Tapei City after Gao and Chen raised $1.5 million for Wu’s mining operation, expecting quick returns. Citing the Chinese ban on cryptocurrency exchanges and ICOs, Wu (nicknamed ‘Milk’) was unable to return their investment on time. Liberty Times Net reports that the gangsters paid Wu a visit and approached him to demand their money.
Following an argument, they drew their handguns (a Beretta and a Taurus) and fired at Wu seven times. Wu was shot but survived the incident, although presumably still owes the Freshwater Gang over a million dollars. Wu is one of many mining freelancers accepting seed capital to launch mining operations in Taiwan.
China has announced plans to shut out Bitcoin mining on top of their ban on exchanges and ICOs, discussion of which may have led to a 20% crash in the crypto market when rumors of the plans emerged.
While bullish on blockchain, the Chinese government and central bank have taken multiple measures against cryptocurrency citing concerns of investor risk, lack of oversight, and environmental concerns. China has relatively low electricity costs in many areas and is home to Bitmain, the manufacturer of the most popular Bitcoin mining hardware.
As such China houses the largest Bitcoin mining operations in the world and the government is also planning to observe the effects of Bitcoin mining on the environment and infrastructure. Currently, Bitcoin mining uses as much electricity as the island of Ireland and is set to use 0.05% of the world’s electricity supply by the end of the year.
Due to the crackdown, Bitmain has started moving offices abroad, receiving approval to purchase sites in the US and Switzerland as nations with low electricity costs and progressive regulations respectively.
The mining pool BTC.TOP also jumped ship and moved to Canada due to the affordable electricity and more lenient government policies regarding Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies.