South Carolina Enacts Bitcoin Self-Custody and Mining Rights Protections

South Carolina enacted Senate Bill 163 on May 19 after Governor Henry McMaster signed the measure, adding Chapter 47 to the state legal code. The law permits individuals and businesses to accept digital assets as payment for lawful goods and services, protects self-custodied and hardware wallets, and bars state and local governments from imposing extra taxes solely because digital assets are used instead of traditional money. It also prohibits South Carolina government offices from accepting payments in a central bank digital currency and bars state personnel from participating in Federal Reserve or other federal CBDC testing programs. The measure defines a CBDC as digital money issued directly by the U.S. Federal Reserve or another federal agency, while clarifying that privately issued dollar-backed digital assets such as USDC are excluded. The law further protects digital asset mining in industrial zones from discriminatory zoning or mining-specific noise restrictions, says that operating blockchain nodes, mining, blockchain software development, and certain staking services do not require money transmitter licenses in specified cases, and states that staking and mining providers are not automatically treated as securities dealers under state law. Large mining operations may be required to provide power purchase agreements to the Public Service Commission to show they can reduce electricity use when the grid is strained.