# Governments Can Restrict Bitcoin Locally, but It Has No Single Global Operator

By Riza Dagoc

Canonical URL: https://www.tokenpost.com/news/regulation/45828
Published: 2026-11-01T11:23:15.000Z
Updated: 2026-11-01T11:23:15.000Z
Section: Regulation

> China’s 2026 rules targeted virtual-currency businesses and mining, while Bitcoin’s global hashrate had nearly recovered to pre-ban levels by December 2021.

Governments can restrict Bitcoin (BTC) activity within their borders by targeting local exchanges, financial services, mining projects and businesses. But Bitcoin has no single global operator a government can order offline, leaving domestic controls distinct from shutting down the worldwide network.

Satoshi Nakamoto described Bitcoin as “a purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash.” Network nodes can leave and rejoin. That design does not prove the network cannot be disrupted; it means a government has no central operator to order it to stop it.

China’s Feb. 6, 2026, notice shows how domestic rules can reach business activity and mining. The People’s Bank of China and seven other authorities deemed virtual-currency-related business activity illegal financial activity. The notice directed officials to close existing mining projects and prohibit new ones. It does not clearly establish that private Bitcoin ownership alone is a crime.

Bitcoin’s global hashrate was 57.47 exahashes per second (EH/s) on June 27, 2021, after China’s mining crackdown. By Dec. 21, it had reached 193.64 EH/s, nearly recovering to pre-ban levels. Those figures show a sharp drop and later recovery in computing power, but do not measure transaction availability or individual users’ access.

A 2025 survey of 49 mining firms in 23 countries covered 268 EH/s, or 48% of the network’s hashrate at the time of data collection. U.S. operations accounted for 75.4% of the mining activity represented. Strong U.S. participation likely made that share larger than the country’s portion of all global mining.

The United States took a different government-level approach. A March 6, 2025, executive order directed the Treasury Department to establish a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve using government Bitcoin that had been finally forfeited. The order concerns government-held assets and does not establish a general rule for private Bitcoin use.