Stand up Europe: Bitcoin is threatened by MiCA

On Monday, March 14th, the European Parliament ECON Committee will vote on the MiCA, the regulation that will define the course of cryptocurrency adoption in the EU. The regulation will be applicable on all the EU member states. This will harmonize the cryptocurrency laws, allowing for companies to access cross border Europe.

So, this regulation is very important.

MICA IS NOT TECH NEUTRAL

The current draft of MiCA will create a significant barrier for Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus as compared to Proof-of Stake (PoS) or other consensus mechanism. Bitcoin relies on PoW consensus, and therefore will be in a significant disadvantageous position if the current draft of MiCA gets approved.

Developers and organizations should be free to choose the technology they deem fit, subject to relevant intellectual property laws. Policy makers around the globe aim to create technology regulations with the principle of neutrality. Favoring one technology over the other can have devasting effect on the market competition and will ultimately harm the end users. So, it’s never wise for any policy makers to favour one technology over the other.

However, the EU policymakers are trying to break from such core principle. Mandating only PoW consensus enabled blockchains to fulfil minimum environmental suitability standard will be detrimental. It seems there are two alternatives that will be voted tomorrow, one imposing such environmental obligation on PoW and other not, as proposed by Dr. Stephan Berger.

REACH OUT TO YOUR MEP

The current differential treatment towards PoW is purely guided by the fear and irrationality. Bitcoin is by far the most decentralized crypto asset in the market and as an industry player we all the having obligation to speak out against such unjust treatment towards PoW.

Being a Luxembourg entity and having operations in the European market, we at STOKR are determined to highlight the hypocrisy and unjust discrimination, policy makers are putting on the PoW enabled blockchain. That is why we are calling on YOU to contact your Member of European Parliament (MEP) and let them know that you oppose a Bitcoin ban in Europe and any unjust, discriminatory obligations on the PoW. 

Michael Roerade was kind enough to compile a list of all Committee members with email addresses and Twitter handles for easy copy/pasting, sorted by country. Feel free to use this and reach out to your respective MEP(s).

Stand up Europe! It is for the FUTURE. 

Arnab Naskar