European Union Votes Against Banning Proof-of-Work Cryptos

The European Union (EU) has rejected a proposal aimed at banning the mining and use of cryptocurrencies running in a proof-of-work method.

The EU Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee voted in favour of the final draft of the Market in Crypto Assets (MICA) proposal on Monday. It has asked the European Commission to present an alternative legislative proposal by January 2025 in order to include in the EU sustainable finance taxonomy any crypto-asset mining activities that contribute substantially to climate change mitigation and adaptation.

The proposal has now failed, but regulations on the trading, mining and use of cryptocurrencies in the region are still awaited. The Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) bill contained 126 articles and a detailed plan to regulate crypto assets in the EU. The rewriting of the bill is still awaited. This may not ban POW currencies but otherwise, focus on cryptocurrency regulation within the EU.

Proof of Work (POW) is a crypto miner reward system that rewards all miners on the network for donating their computing power to transactions. It is used by Bitcoin and POW is also the primary control method for this blockchain while Ethereum is moving to another proof of stake system.