On November 15, the cryptocurrency network split again. This is the third hard fork in four years. The project is in an unstable position, which may negatively affect its future
Conflicting hard forks, leading to the division of the network and the split of the community into two camps, are a big problem, says Bitcoin Cash supporter Roger Ver. In an interview with CoinDesk, he stressed that if PayPal found out about the disagreements within the project, it might not have added Bitcoin Cash at all (in addition to BCH, American users of the payment system can buy, sell and store Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin).
Bitcoin Cash itself came about as a result of the bitcoin hard fork. Some developers insisted on increasing the block size in the blockchain of the first cryptocurrency. They believed that the creator of the asset, Satoshi Nakamoto, meant primarily low-cost peer-to-peer transactions as the main value of the new technology.
Now the BCH network is updated every six months. When the community cannot reach consensus, the chain splits. For example, this happened in 2018, as a result of the November hard fork, Bitcoin SV (Satoshi Vision) cryptocurrency appeared. In 2020, the Bitcoin Cash Node (BCHN) coin appeared, which became dominant after the update and received the ticker BCH.
Such events negatively affect the value of the cryptocurrency. In December 2017, it reached a historical maximum value of $ 4 thousand. At the same time, bitcoin was trading at $ 20 thousand. However, since then, the price of BTC has practically won back the fall, reaching $ 16.5 thousand in November this year, while BCH is still is trading 94% below its all-time high.
The project is still in a very unstable position, and the community has serious disagreements regarding its further development, said Tatyana Maksimenko, the official representative of the Garantex cryptocurrency exchange. She added that she doubted the prospects for all bitcoin forks.
“None of them have achieved even a fraction of what bitcoin has achieved in 12 years of its existence. Why do you need Bitcoin Cash if you have Bitcoin? Better to create something radically new than trying to make an improved version of Bitcoin. In my opinion, investing in Bitcoin Cash was not worth it even before the current fork. From the very beginning, there was a strong influence of opinion leaders – the same Roger Vera, which always affects decentralization not for the better. If you want to buy bitcoins, it is better to buy them, and not modified copies,” Maksimenko advised.
Crypto Exchange CEO Andrey Podolyan agreed with her. In his opinion, now it is far from the most interesting coin on the market. The expert stressed that the main thing in many crypto coins is the community. If the community does not support the coin, then none of the most advanced technologies will save it. At the same time, there are constant splits in the Bitcoin Cash community, which does not in the best way affect its prospects.
