Kazakhstan received $1.5 million from the crypto mining industry in the first three months of the year

Kazakhstan has received 652 million tenge or $1.5 million from the crypto mining industry in the first quarter of the year 2022, bitcoin.com reported, citing official data. The money has been collected through a surcharge newly levied on the electricity used by crypto mining firms operating illegally in the country. The new surcharge was introduced in January 2022, although it is not yet part of Kazakhstan’s tax code.
The surcharge has been imposed since January 1, 2022 at the rate of 1 tenge per kilowatt-hour of electrical energy burned for the extraction of cryptocurrencies. The crypto mining companies have been instructed to pay the fee by 20th of the month following the particular quarter. In April 2022, the Kazakh government revealed that it is preparing to increase the tax burden for cryptocurrency miners and wants to tie the new rate to the value of the minted cryptocurrency. The government expects the approach to be beneficial for the state budget.
The electricity consumption by the mining industry has been rising in Kazakhstan ever since it became a hotspot for mining activities following the crypto ban in China in September 2021. In order to curb the growing power consumption by illegally operating mining companies, the Kazakh government passed new tax amendments on crypto mining in the lower house of the parliament in May 2022. The government also plans to introduce differentiated tax rates depending on the cost of consumed electrical energy.
Around the same time, the Minister of Digital Development, Bagdat Muhsin also issued a legal order mandated the cryptocurrency miners to submit quarterly reports to the authority about location of mining farms, power requirements for their mining facilities, technical description of how the hardware will be connected to the power grid and proof of the ownership of the mining equipment being operated in the country.