The legislation included revisions to laws aimed at prohibiting discriminatory electricity rates for mining companies and not allowing the taxation of cryptocurrencies used as a method of payment.
Greg Gianforte, Montana’s governor has signed a bill that largely prevents local governments in the state from passing laws banning cryptocurrency mining.
According to the records of the Montana legislature, Gianforte signed SB178 on May 2, after the bill had passed both the state House of Representatives and the state Senate. The legislation effectively enshrines the rights of cryptocurrency miners in the state by revising current laws, prohibiting discriminatory electricity rates for mining companies, and not allowing the imposition of taxes on cryptocurrencies used as a method of payment.
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The latest version of the bill suggested that the legislation was introduced partly as a preventative measure in response to certain proposals in other states, i.e. “mining for digital assets has often faced difficulties with regulations at the state and local levels.” For example, in April, lawmakers in the Texas State Senate introduced a bill intended to limit incentives for cryptocurrency miners to participate in a program intended to compensate them for load reductions on the state’s power grid. state.
BREAKING: The State of Montana has officially signed the ‘Right to Mine’ #Bitcoin bill into law. pic.twitter.com/f3PD1WgTOW
— Satoshi Action Fund (@SatoshiActFund) May 4, 2023
The cryptocurrency advocacy group Satoshi Action Fund has supported pro-mining legislation in some US states. Lawmakers in the Arkansas State House and Senate have passed a bill similar to Montana’s SB178. Satoshi Action Fund CEO Dennis Porter reported that Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders had already signed this bill into law, but the legislature website did not show such action at the time of publication of this story.
“At the state level, we can go a long way, we can get things moving, and there’s not much the federal government can do in the meantime,” said Porter.
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Similar legislation in favor of mining there was been advancing in the Mississippi state legislature, but the bill “died” in March. Porter said that a Missouri bill was “a little further behind in the process” but still making its way through the legislature.
At the federal level, the administration Biden ha recently renewed its proposal of a 30% tax on cryptocurrency miners as part of a proposed budget for fiscal year 2024. The tax could affect the electricity consumption of miners.
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