Yes. Let's imagine they tried to make Bitmain, which is based in a China, a state-owned company. Now Bitmain has control of two of the largest mining pools Antpool and BTC.com. They're also the world's biggest supplier of miners. But they are incorporated in Singapore, unlike Alibaba and other conglomerates which are incorporated in China. That means Bitmain is subject to Singapore's business laws not China's. China can only govern business practices that Bitmain does inside China (i.e. sale of their miners to China residents), and fine Bitmain if they break any Chinese laws while doing business there. A list of things that China would not be able to do is:
- Block mergers or acquisitions
- Collecting taxes
- Taking majority ownership of Bitmain, as it is a privately owned company there are no stocks to buy
among other things.
The Chinese operations of all companies with a presence there have to follow their laws such as Starbucks, Nike and Apple, but the rest of the company outside of China isn't bound to them.
They cannot take over the mining pools because that is private property of the corporations.
you're putting too much trust in the rule of law, and china's respect for it.
consider the recent case of okex---an exchange that left china, incorporated offshore in malta, and stopped offering CNY markets after china banned exchanges in 2017. 3 months ago,
the CEO was arrested and held by chinese police. and then for a 5-week period, okex completely shut down all crypto withdrawals.
that's the kind of power the chinese government has. mining hardware companies and pools that have a physical presence in china, with executives/admins who have a physical presence and family/financial assets held there---they are
not safe from chinese government influence.
