The possibility of another bitcoin hardfork.

[DVlog]

Recently, we have seen many big institutions, like Black Rock, Invesco, Fidelity investment, Ark Investment, WisdomTree, JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs etc take an interest in bitcoin. The hottest application in the show is the BlackRock ETF application which many think is a catalyst for bitcoin.


Historically we have seen how big companies tried to take control of the bitcoin network but failed miserably due to a lack of strong support. Controlling the network seems like a major interest for the institutions. This time not only institutions but also the US government are on the list due to their anti crypto policies. Though the SEC claims that bitcoin is a commodity, they still consider it a threat to their financial institutions. They can’t allow such financial freedom among their residents as they fear they will lose control over their people which will diminish some billionaires interest.


If you read the Blackrocks ETF application then you will see there is a clause that states that

In the event of a hard fork of the Bitcoin network, the Sponsor will, if permitted by the terms of the Trust Agreement, use its discretion to determine which network should be considered the appropriate network for the Trust’s purposes, and in doing so may adversely affect the value of the Shares.

 
This means blackrock can determine which network they will consider the appropriate one so it is reasonable to think they might think about pushing another bitcoin hardfork and setting their own rules to consider it the appropriate network. However BlackRock is the 2nd largest shareholder of the top 4 bitcoin mining companies which share a significant portion of the bitcoin mining profit and can also decide which bitcoin network will come first.

All this is speculative thinking and might never happens but with the influence and wealth blackrock like entities hold it is not impossible to try to do anything like this. I don't know this topic has been discussed in the forum before or not but i am curious to know what the community thinks about its.

• Do you think this can be a secret operation by the us government with Blackrock to take control over the network or is this just nothing more than speculative thinking?
  
• What will the impact be do you think if they try to do that in the future?

Source: https://blockworks.co/news/blackrock-bitcoin-etf-wolf

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[hatshepsut93]

This has already been discussed. It's not easy to takeover Bitcoin, because Bitcoin is not only the network and miners but the users too. Without having the majority of everyone onboard - miners, exchanges, businesses, developers, community, holders and so on - this would be nothing but a costly and failed attempt of takeover. Something like what happened with SegWit2x.

And I don't think that Blackrock put that clause with intention of artificially fulfilling it, it's just a contingency for an edge case.

[davis196]

What's the point for Blackrock to take control over the Bitcoin Core blockchain? Reversing transactions?
Blackrock cares about the Bitcoin price, not about the Bitcoin blockchain. They have the power to pump the BTC price really high.
Trying to divide the BTC community by imposing a hardfork might have a negative effect over the BTC price.
It is clearly stated in the text, which you have posted, that in a case of a hardfork, Blackrock will have to decide which version Bitcoin will be considered as "the real Bitcoin". I think that "the real Bitcoin" will be the one, that has the most active users, miners and developers.
It's pointless for Blackrock to their own forked Bitcoin, if the majority of the Bitcoin users miners and developers won't support it.

[ronniereagan]

Blackrock is the US government as a financial shell institution.

[franky1]

i find it funny how people take one snippet but dont then read the next paragraph

all those institutions say they will base the choice on which fork wins the brand name of bitcoin based on: the core devs maintaining it and economic nodes follow it.. in short they are advocating that core devs and "NYA" economic nodes are the sole authority of bitcoin law. and these sponsors of ETF will follow these prime authority (core devs and NYA participants)

In the event of a hard fork of the Bitcoin network, the Sponsor will, if permitted by the terms of the Trust Agreement, use its discretion to determine which network should be considered the appropriate network for the Trust’s purposes, and in doing so may adversely affect the value of the Shares.

In the event of a hard fork of the Bitcoin network, the Sponsor will, as permitted by the terms of the Trust Agreement, use its sole discretion to determine, in good faith, which peer-to-peer network, among a group of incompatible forks of the Bitcoin network, is generally accepted as the Bitcoin network and should therefore be considered the appropriate network for the Trust’s purposes. The Sponsor will base its determination on whatever factors it deems relevant, including but not limited to, the Sponsor’s beliefs regarding expectations of the core developers of bitcoin, users, services, businesses, miners and other constituencies, as well as the actual continued acceptance of, mining power on, and community engagement with, the Bitcoin network, or whatever other factors it deems relevant.

[ronniereagan]

Because of China and other countries foothold, Blackrock is why it is what it is.

[Synchronice]

If you read the Blackrocks ETF application then you will see there is a clause that states that

In the event of a hard fork of the Bitcoin network, the Sponsor will, if permitted by the terms of the Trust Agreement, use its discretion to determine which network should be considered the appropriate network for the Trust’s purposes, and in doing so may adversely affect the value of the Shares.

 
This means blackrock can determine which network they will consider the appropriate one so it is reasonable to think they might think about pushing another bitcoin hardfork and setting their own rules to consider it the appropriate network.

Sure, isn't that what absolutely everyone does when there is a hardfork? You choose which network to support, original bitcoin or its hard fork. Shouldn't they state that in their application?

Do you think this can be a secret operation by the us government with Blackrock to take control over the network or is this just nothing more than speculative thinking?

Maybe Bitcoin is a secret operation by the US government under the pseudoname of Satoshi who just come out of nowhere and disappeared out of nowhere?

You are overthinking here, Blackrock investing in bitcoin is something that logically they should have done years ago because they are an investment company.
Blackrock is not a threat, even if there is a hardfork and they support it, there is no threat for those who use bitcoin because they can use original anytime. Does price of bitcoin forks or altcoins matter for you when you want to have a decentralized network and improved privacy? You use bitcoin because you believe in these fundamentals, right? That's all that matters for you then, not a cash flow.

[electronicash]

are they really going to risk dividing again while theynwill not benefit from it?
the hardfork will once again fall same as Bitcoin Cash where only few will use and then blackrock aill just be giving away free money. if they are willing to do that then Bitcoiners are ready to spend it.

free money if free money. many will be happy about it. but look at what the price of BCH after giving away. blackrock is on the losing side if they do that.

[Z-tight]

• Do you think this can be a secret operation by the us government with Blackrock to take control over the network or is this just nothing more than speculative thinking?
  

Take off your tinfoil hat buddy, there mustn't be a conspiracy theory in these things as people always try to make out. Why would Blackrock want to try to take over a decentralized project, how do you even take control of a network that does not have a single point of failure.

Take note that no matter the influence you have over BTC businesses like exchanges and other BTC tools like mining, you can't control the network in itself, that is why it has no single point of failure. Blackrock are here to make money and not to spoil their name with negative news or to get involved in a 'secret operation'.

[franky1]

• Do you think this can be a secret operation by the us government with Blackrock to take control over the network or is this just nothing more than speculative thinking?
  

Take off your tinfoil hat buddy, there mustn't be a conspiracy theory in these things as people always try to make out. Why would Blackrock want to try to take over a decentralized project, how do you even take control of a network that does not have a single point of failure.

Take note that no matter the influence you have over BTC businesses like exchanges and other BTC tools like mining, you can't control the network in itself, that is why it has no single point of failure. Blackrock are here to make money and not to spoil their name with negative news or to get involved in a 'secret operation'.

dont be so sure
USER NODES cannot veto a fork. they are limp nodes that just accept anydata as "isvalid" if they dont understand a change.
the whole DCG sponsoring the core devs and the NYA clan of economic nodes did cause an UNNATURAL 100% consensus vote without needing user nodes

so the right fingers on the right puppets can change the protocol. and yes core is a point of failure.. its literally in their descriptor of their role. they are the reference client. and any other node brand that tries to change the main protocol rules has faced REKT campaigns being treated as the enemy and not a proposal option for network upgrades

there is a central point of failure. which is the core devs. which is why we should review, scrutinise and critique their code to ensure they do not abuse their power, and also keep an eye on their sponsors to see who is influencing code changes

[moneystery]

i mean, it will be very difficult for a large institution to be able to control bitcoin as a whole. the bitcoin ecosystem is large and if there is a person/entity wants to control bitcoin they need a lot of resources and the acceptance of all parties in the network.

and because of this i am not afraid that there is one party who wants to control bitcoin because after all their efforts will be in vain as long as bitcoin has a solid community that supports the development of decentralized ecosystems that are free from the control of certain parties.

[mk4]

I've read multiple times from lawyers in the crypto space that these clauses are just for regulatory reasons — pretty much some sort of "catch all" clause to protect them from whatever happens in the future; knowing how uncertain a lot of things are.

[franky1]

I've read multiple times from lawyers in the crypto space that these clauses are just for regulatory reasons — pretty much some sort of "catch all" clause to protect them from whatever happens in the future; knowing how uncertain a lot of things are.

yep, agreed
but it is still funny to see people take a snippet of one clause out of its context to blow up some nonsense story, without putting it into the context of the very next clause which satisfies the details of the first clause

[DVlog]

What's the point for Blackrock to take control over the Bitcoin Core blockchain? Reversing transactions?
Blackrock cares about the Bitcoin price, not about the Bitcoin blockchain. They have the power to pump the BTC price really high.
Trying to divide the BTC community by imposing a hardfork might have a negative effect over the BTC price.
It is clearly stated in the text, which you have posted, that in a case of a hardfork, Blackrock will have to decide which version Bitcoin will be considered as "the real Bitcoin". I think that "the real Bitcoin" will be the one, that has the most active users, miners and developers.
It's pointless for Blackrock to their own forked Bitcoin, if the majority of the Bitcoin users miners and developers won't support it.

What if they want to create their own set of rules for a new bitcoin network and with a hardfork they can get the coin cheaper than current bitcoin? They have the money to push the newly forked coin higher than bitcoin if they have the backing of the US government or their wall street friends. You have said the majority of the bitcoin miners won't support it but i have already shared that Bloackrock is the 2nd biggest share holder of the world top 4 out of 5 bitcoin mining companies. They do have great influence over a large portion of mining power. It won't be hard for them to convince some or all of them to join the new network but it is true that there is no guarantee that they will get community support.

[Bitcoinpoly]

Recently, we have seen many big institutions, like Black Rock, Invesco, Fidelity investment, Ark Investment, WisdomTree, JP Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs etc take an interest in bitcoin. The hottest application in the show is the BlackRock ETF application which many think is a catalyst for bitcoin.


Historically we have seen how big companies tried to take control of the bitcoin network but failed miserably due to a lack of strong support. Controlling the network seems like a major interest for the institutions. This time not only institutions but also the US government are on the list due to their anti crypto policies. Though the SEC claims that bitcoin is a commodity, they still consider it a threat to their financial institutions. They can’t allow such financial freedom among their residents as they fear they will lose control over their people which will diminish some billionaires interest.


If you read the Blackrocks ETF application then you will see there is a clause that states that

In the event of a hard fork of the Bitcoin network, the Sponsor will, if permitted by the terms of the Trust Agreement, use its discretion to determine which network should be considered the appropriate network for the Trust’s purposes, and in doing so may adversely affect the value of the Shares.

 
This means blackrock can determine which network they will consider the appropriate one so it is reasonable to think they might think about pushing another bitcoin hardfork and setting their own rules to consider it the appropriate network. However BlackRock is the 2nd largest shareholder of the top 4 bitcoin mining companies which share a significant portion of the bitcoin mining profit and can also decide which bitcoin network will come first.

https://www.talkimg.com/images/2023/10/29/T8WId.png

All this is speculative thinking and might never happens but with the influence and wealth blackrock like entities hold it is not impossible to try to do anything like this. I don't know this topic has been discussed in the forum before or not but i am curious to know what the community thinks about its.

• Do you think this can be a secret operation by the us government with Blackrock to take control over the network or is this just nothing more than speculative thinking?
  
• What will the impact be do you think if they try to do that in the future?

Source: https://blockworks.co/news/blackrock-bitcoin-etf-wolf

The possibility of this seems very hard and come to think it, right from on set Bitcoin has been staying strong and there might not be anything of such even in the next 30 years.

[DVlog]

The possibility of this seems very hard and come to think it, right from on set Bitcoin has been staying strong and there might not be anything of such even in the next 30 years.

This seems hard as the bitcoin network is growing exponentially but it is not impossible in theory. And we have seen people tried to do something like this before which is why there are more than 100 bitcoin hardfork networks, a lot of them are dead. However, the USA's anti crypto policy can be a concern because they might be thinking something like this, maybe not by blackrock but by any other means. This might never happen but there were several attempts before so there can be more in the future.

[Casdinyard]

It's quite possible considering the pressing need of the public for a bitcoin derivative that focuses more on the payment side of things than the earning and the profit area of the spectrum. We can't really force bitcoin to submit to the needs of the few, so a hardfork is quite possible to appease this niche. Scalability and general purpose are also things that have bugged the network for years now, and despite the attempts at solving this courtesy of the layer2 solutions laid in place, we can't really find a good way for bitcoin to reliably solve the scalability problem it was bestowed with from the get-go. Hopefully we see something happen in the future but for now, the most that we could really do is sit down and watch as the whole thing unfolds.

[thecodebear]

I find all these "blackrock is planning on taking over the bitcoin network" conspiracy theories a bit silly. Come on now. Ever since Blackrock put out their ETF application the conspiracy nuts have gone crazy with that line.


Literally all blackrock is describing in that line they wrote is that if a fork happens they will have to choose which resulting chain the ETF tracks. Nothing remotely controversial in that statement. Cuz of course they will have to choose which fork the ETF tracks, because its an ETF! The ETF owners don't own actual Bitcoin so they don't get all the coins from all resulting forks, because, again, its an ETF, not actual ownership of bitcoins, so blackrock (or any ETF issuer) would have to decide which fork is followed (naturally the fork that remains Bitcoin).

All they did was describe what happens when a blockchain forks lol. It's not some big secret conspiracy to take over bitcoin. They literally just described what a blockchain fork is. Naturally they would choose whichever fork is Bitcoin, otherwise you'd have all the ETF owners dumping that ETF immediately if Blackrock decided to have the ETF track some offshoot altcoin of Bitcoin in the event of a hard fork. Not every thing is a conspiracy people. This one is just common sense, Blackrock describing what happens in the case of a fork.

[digaran]

I believe this is franky's territory, he will submit 500 posts to prove that core team is the single point of failure, well of course they are, no matter what, blackrock, blockstream, core team, whatever they do is going to be in the interest of Bitcoin, if they deviate from the core principles of Bitcoin, they will loose more than others, if they fail as the single point, well they will be replaced. Yes that's how easy it is.

We can't maintain a system by dancing to every song, logical thing is to dance to one song at a time.

[The Cryptovator]

It's impossible to control the Bitcoin network at all. BlackRock buying mining companies shares doesn't mean they want to gain access to the network. They can't change anything, and they can't make any harmful decisions. And forking Bitcoin means nothing. They can't gain anything by forking the Bitcoin blockchain. It will just create a new altcoin. And still, Bitcoin will be uncontrollable under any conditions. If BlackRock is a US secret mission to control Bitcoin, then they are wrong.