Venezuela's Anti-Corruption Investigation Rocks Cryptocurrency Industry: Exchanges and Mining Farms Shut Down

cryptonews.com:

Venezuelan crypto companies - specifically mining farms and exchanges - have reportedly been ordered to shut down over the past few days, following the President's order to restructure the country’s crypto regulatory agency. They seem to have been a casualty of an investigation that resulted in the arrest of 21 individuals.

According to the tweets from Venezuela’s National Association of Cryptocurrencies, citing a local media report, mining facilities were shut down in Bolívar, adding that,

"We consider this an arbitrary measure, which goes against the interests of private industry." 

Bolívar is not the only state impacted, as Lara and Carabobo reportedly saw the same action against the facilities located there. The shutdowns, other reports say, are seen throughout the country. 

Private company Doctorminer's CEO Theodoro Toukoumidis and CBO Juan Jose Pinto issued a statement on March 23, saying that there has been a situation affecting the proper delivery of their service to international hosting customers for "an uncertain period of time." 

It stated that, 

"Following the change of administration at the government crypto regulator, SUNACRIP, due to investigations to possible mishandling of public funds, the national energy supplier (CORPOELEC) is ordering the shutdown of hashrate infrastructures nationwide while investigations are ongoing."

They added that they couldn't say how long the "longer than usual power cut" would last. 

There is currently no verified information as to how many mining companies have been shut down. The reports claim that the licensed mining farms have been closed down as well, calling for their reopening and arguing that the measure is costing people their jobs and the country the taxes paid by these