Bitcoin (BTC) remains the most popular cryptocurrency, but it’s not without flaws. Specifically, it allows a relatively low volume of transactions per second, limiting its utility for payments.
Bitcoin Cash (BCH) came into being in 2017 to address this issue, offering a cheaper, faster way to process payments. Since that time, Bitcoin Cash has grown into one of the top 30 coins in the market today.
If you are one of the more than one million Australians that now own cryptocurrencies, you may be wondering what the real difference is between the two and what the pros and cons are of each crypto.
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What Is Bitcoin Cash?
Bitcoin Cash is a cryptocurrency built on the same blockchain as Bitcoin. The coin launched on 1 August, 2017 through a so-called “hard fork” of the Bitcoin blockchain.
Some Bitcoin blockchain participants proposed altering the rules to allow Bitcoin to process a greater volume of transactions. Most nodes voted against changing the rules, which resulted in the hard fork, creating two blockchain paths with a common origin: Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash.
“It felt almost like the fracturing of a religion,” said Henrik Gebbing, co-founder and co-CEO of Finoa, a digital asset custodian. “Miners had to decide which chain to allocate their efforts toward, exchanges had to decide whether or not to support trading of this newly forked currency, and market participants had to decide whether they had any interest in the new currency and what its fair price should be.”
How Does Bitcoin Cash Work?
Bitcoin Cash uses a larger block size than Bitcoin—blocks are groups of…
