Jiang Zhouer, the founder of BTC.top, a major Chinese cryptocurrency mining pool, has recently revealed that in the upcoming Bitcoin Cash (BCH) hard fork, it’ll support the side that has the most hashpower.
According to a post from microblogging platform Weibo, Zhouer denied rumors that claimed BTC.top would support the Bitcoin ABC development team, and revealed that, in a “bid to end the chaotic situation as soon as possible” it’ll side with the implementation that invests more into hashrate.
Zhouer’s words imply BTC.top’s goal is to merely recover stability for the cryptocurrency, which has been seeing two sides – Bitcoin Cash ABC and Bitcoin Cash SV – engage in a “war” that will likely result in a chain split. Behind the conflict are differences on how to scale BCH, as one side – ABC – is looking to implement technological improvements, while the other plans on quadrupling the network’s block size to 128 MB.
Currently, major BCH mining pools like Coingeek, Mempool, BMG and SVP support BCHSV, while Bitcoin.com, Antpool, and ViaBTC support BCHABC. Currently, Coin.Dance data shows BCHSV has a majority of the network’s hashrate.
This means BCHSV, backed by self-proclaimed Satoshi Nakamoto Craig Wright, could use its hashrate to “choke” the BCHABC side after the network splits by mining empty blocks. This would stop transactions from being processed.
In his post, Zhouer notably argued that a hashpower war is only going to damage the cryptocurrency’s ecosystem, and that it’s “meaningless.” Per his words, the result will come down to a battle between Craig Wright’s wealth and Bitmain’s hashpower.
If the hash war breaks out, over 100 million yuan [$14.3 million] will be spent each day. The camp which is willing to throw more money at it is likely to win the war.
While initially traders were starting to support the BCHABC side on Poloniex’s pre-fork “futures,” things started changing as soon as Craig Wright, during an interview with Tone Vays, revealed SV had a majority of the network’s hashrate. Craig Wright has called Poloniex’s pre-fork futures a “criminal offence.”
The War May Not Be Over
While the BCHSV side is currently dominating the network’s hashrate, some analysts have pointed out the hash war may not yet be over. Bitmain, the world’s largest cryptocurrency mining hardware manufacturer, operates the Antpool mining pool, which currently has 12% of the BTC network’s hashrate.
If it were to move the pool’s hashpower to BCH, it could help BCHABC survive the hash wars. As CryptoGlobe covered, the company has been looking to deploy 90,000 Antminer S9 ASICs to increase hashpower.
This may not happen, however, as BCHABC proponent Jihan Wu, the company’s co-founder, has recently seen its official designation change from director to supervisor, meaning he can no longer participate in the company’s business decisions.
Commenting on the change, Zhouer noted analysts shouldn’t dig too deep into the company’s change. Per his words, if Wright and SV decide to attack BCHABC, Bitmain will “inevitably fight back.”
Currently, BCHSV and BCHABC are trading close to each other. While BCHSV’s future briefly surpassed those of the protocol supported by the ABC development team, they’re currently trading at $208, as BCHABC recovered to $269.
