Vietnam says all imports of bitcoin mining equipment has halted

Vietnam has effectively halted all imports of crypto mining equipment since the beginning of July according to the government.

This follows from the Ministry of Finance’s proposal to place a ban on bitcoin mining machine imports earlier this year as a “means to improve the management of bitcoin and cryptocurrency transactions.”

Although cryptocurrencies like bitcoin are though to be “illegal non-cash payment methods”, the bitcoin mining machines were not on a list of banned imports.

Crypto scam led to ban

Bitcoin mining according to the Minstry led to the illegal use of the cryptocurrencies.  The country has imported around 15,600 bitcoin mining machines with figures showing around 6,300 incoming just in the first four months of the year.

The Vietnamese government has increased scrutiny following a reported incident this year where a Ho Chi Minh-based company Modern Tech defrauded an estimated $666m from 32,000 individuals in two crypto scams.

As a result, in April this year government officials directed various ministries and agencies to impose stricter measures of imports of crypto mining devices and to the proposal of the current ban backed by the Vietnamese central bank.