Going into a war over a block size increase would cause a crash in the price of Bitcoin, according to angel investor in Bitcoin and Ethereum startups, Chandler Guo.
In an interview with ether.camp, he noted that, overall, the block size argument has been positive for the value of Bitcoin. Guo also believes that too much control will lead to no control and likened the situation to Hillary Clinton’s loss in the recent U.S. presidential elections. According to Gao, president-elect Donald Trump won exactly because he does everything by himself and is not controlled by anyone, unlike most other politicians.
Bitcoin is Trump, Ether is Hillary
Guo says in the video:
“A lot of people don’t like Trump but the people voted for him to become the President of the United States because people like everything that is out of control, not everything under control. Think about Ethereum today, when they hardforked, ETH crashed down. Till right now, it’s still crashed down only because people don’t like the Ethereum Foundation’s control. People like Bitcoin today because Bitcoin is totally out of anyone’s control over size problem.”
He added that the problem has persisted for about three years and there have been several conferences to discuss the issue but none of the various parties - exchanges, miners, mining pools, Bitcoin Classic, Bitcoin Unlimited, Bitcoin Core and other Bitcoin companies - have been able to control it.
Guo said:
“No one can control Bitcoin and the people like it. Think about it: two years ago, why did we want the block size to increase? Because it was $200. Bitcoin was too cheap. People wanted the block size raised and for the price of Bitcoin to go up. Everyone wanted the Bitcoin price to go up to $700. But the Core developers were not under any control so they didn’t change from using the 1MB. In two years up till today, it is already $700.”
He further states that although expected, many people do not want to have a war over block size because they are happy with the current situation. He cited an instance where those at Bitcoin Unlimited want a block size increase while a lot of Bitcoin users think the current price of $700 seems good to them even as the block size remains at 1MB, such that they may think maybe the problem is not with the block size. So, no one is sure if the price will crash when the block size goes to 2MB or even 4MB hence the fear of going into a war right now.
Agreement outlines
He explains: “Even the miners in this today, they don’t want a war because if there should be a war and they can’t mine, it would take them a year to make their money. Miners just want to stay there: $700 is a good price; $800 is a good price. If there is a war and the price crashes down, everybody will lose money. Mining pools don’t care actually because the transaction fee is good - 5 percent of the reward. Right now, I think a lot of Bitcoin companies and Bitcoin shareholders want the price of Bitcoin to keep growing. For example, the mining equipment companies want the price to go to $10,000 so they can sell more equipment; for shareholders who have a lot of Bitcoins, they want the price of Bitcoin to go up; to normal Bitcoin people, they say it’s (the price) already three times in a year.”
Despite this concern, Guo urged the key parties to stay within the community and resolve the block size issue by having an agreement instead of going into a full blown war that could lead to two chains or two coins with different names - BTC and BTU - in the future as well as a price crash. He also suggested that if they can’t make an agreement, the block size could be raised to 1.2MB to avoid a war and losses.