According to ChainCatcher, the People's Court of Jiahe County, Hunan Province, recently made a judgment on a major mining machine transaction dispute. The case shows that the plaintiff Pan Mouxiang communicated with the defendant Lei Moucai through WeChat in November 2021 to purchase a Bitcoin mining machine S19XP. After paying 23.678 million USDT, the two parties had differences on the nature of the contract and the settlement price. The plaintiff asked the defendant to return the difference of 6.27 million USDT and continue to deliver 149 mining machines.
The court ruled to dismiss all the plaintiff's claims, mainly based on two reasons: First, according to the notice on further preventing and dealing with the risks of speculation in virtual currency transactions issued by the central bank and other departments, virtual currencies such as USDT do not have the status of legal tender, and related transactions are illegal financial activities.
Secondly, according to the notice from the National Development and Reform Commission (on rectifying the activities of virtual currency 'mining'), mining activities with mining machines consume a lot of energy, have high carbon emissions, and contribute little economically, which does not comply with the national green development strategy. The court ruled that the transaction contract is invalid due to violations of laws and regulations and public order and morals, and the related losses shall be borne by both parties themselves.