Last year, BCH split off from BTC Aug 1st. Approaching that date, BTC price rose steadily. After that date, BTC price rose steadily.
August 1st, BCH had some value, and later rose. The net value of BTC + BCH was greater than BTC alone. Why?
IMHO: the initial split of BCH off of BTC resolved a conflict within the BTC community. The "big blockers" had been at odds with the "SegWit" camp in BTC for years, and that contention had been holding back progress, which held back the value.
After the split, the BCH camp were free to pursue their big-block/on-chain agenda, and those who stayed with BTC were free to explore SegWit, Lightning Network, etc. The split resolved a debate. Instead of one group with infighting, it became two groups following their visions.
Sure, "marketing wars" followed, and trolls bashed each other, but the developers in both camps were free to make progress.
Today, we're seeing two factions of BCH at war, but the value of BCH has been diving as we approach the split. Why?
The contentious issues are not major and long-standing, like last year; they are relatively minor debates that emerged in recent months. And it doesn't feel like this split will resolve anything. The rhetoric implies that the split will be the beginning of an ongoing war.
TL;DR: the BTC/BCH split felt like the end of a feud, so valuations rose. The ABC/SV split feels like the beginning of a civil war, so valuations may fall, especially for the warring parties, until the victors are resolved.
Meanwhile, the whole crypto sector's values can be dragged down by the warring.
Unpopular speculation: I have a hunch we'll see a bit of Bitcoin pullback this weekend & and a bit of an alt rally. Why? A thread.
Weekday traders don't like to go home long on Friday. They tend to go to cash, so there's a Friday downdraft.
The also trade Bitcoin more heavily than other assets.
Weekend speculators feel differently - they trade a lot of alts, and trade on weekends. On the other hand, they're less likely to trade fundamentals, and more likely to trade on TA setups.
So if Bitcoin backs off for the weekend, we'll probably see weekend speculators amplify the pullback towards $9000. I consider this a healthy pullback, not bearish.
Bitcoin (BTC) is doing great 💪and I'm super-bullish for the year.
Tech tips for those watching the Cash Wars: yesterday's way of watching blocks doesn't apply any more. A little info on DAAs and Hashrates is in order. (Thread.)
BCH has a per-block DAA (Difficulty Adjustment Algorithm.) Mining Difficulty adjusts after every block, based on the previous 144 block average. (SMA - Simple Moving Average.) If blocks are slow, it gets easier to speed them up; if blocks are fast, it gets harder to slow them.
BCH has split into ABC and SV, with different progress rates, so also now with different Difficulties. SV blocks are coming slower, so SV Difficulty is coming down (to speed the blocks up.) So long as SOME miners continue, neither of these chains will grind to a halt.