In a dramatic move, leading cryptoasset exchange Binance announced today that it will delist Bitcoin Satoshi’s Vision (BSV).
The delisting will take place on April 22 at 10:00 UTC, and at that time all BSV trades will be cancelled and removed from the orderbooks. The cryptoassets will be available for withdrawal from Binance until July of this year.
The move comes after a period of intense online drama involving BSV’s backer Craig Wright, who claims to be Satoshi Nakamoto, the inventor of the original Bitcoin (BTC)
As CryptoGlobe reported, Wright recently offered a bounty of $5,000 for the doxing of one of his online critics, Twitter user “hodlnaut.”
Further, Wright last week issued legal notices to several of his critics, including host of the crypto podcast What Bitcoin Did, Peter McCormack, who has publicly asserted that Wright is not the inventor of Bitcoin. McCormack was threatened with a lawsuit for libel on this basis.
Do the right thing. https://t.co/z7HGsAZnmR
— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) April 15, 2019
Changpeng Zhao (CZ) Follows Through on Threat
The delisting follows several tweets from the Binance CEO where he reaffirmed the position of McCormack and much of Crypto Twitter that Craig Wright is not Satoshi, and threatened to delist the coin:
Craig Wright is not Satoshi.
Anymore of this sh!t, we delist! https://t.co/hrnt3fDACq
— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) April 12, 2019
In the official announcement on Binance’s website, the exchange outlined its process for delisting assets, explaining that it conduct reviews “periodically” to determine if a cryptoasset “continues to meet the high level of standard we expect.” Among the factors the exchange says it considers during this review are “evidence of unethical / fraudulent conduct” and “contribution to a healthy and sustainable crypto ecosystem.”
Binance Moves Markets
The immediate market reaction to this news has not been kind, showing Binance’s influence in the industry. At the time of writing, BSV is already down 10% versus USDT.
The price effect on Bitcoin Cash (BCH), instead, has been the complete inverse, with the crypto seeing an 11% rally in price – presumably also as a direct result of the news. Being the direct competitor, in a sense, to BSV, this should come as no surprise after the fractious hard fork in November of 2018.
