Ethereum Classic - another outlaw worth over $ 500 million

Contrary to appearances, it is not Ethereum Classic that has disconnected from the "home" Ethereum network. The division was created as a result of actions that some people consider to be one of the biggest thefts in the history of the cryptocurrency market, and others considered it not only acceptable, but also fully legal.

We continue the Forex Club Portal cycle, in which we describe the largest, most known, the most interesting and the most controversial cryptocurrency projects in the world. Today is the time for Ethereum Classic, a cryptocurrency whose capitalization currently exceeds USD 0,5 billion.

How Ethereum Classic was created

In the case of cryptocurrencies with two names, like Bitcoin Gold or Bitcoin SV, the matter is almost always simple. The new cryptocurrency is the "little brother" of tokens with the same name, most often resulting from a hard fork, i.e. disconnecting part of the chain. It's not that simple with Ethereum Classic (ETC). This cryptocurrency existed since October 2016, but under the name of ... Ethereum. After the network split, it changed its name to Ethereum Classic, and the disconnected chain took the name Ethereum (ETH).

Unusual breakdown of the Ethereum network

The DAO venture capital fund contributed to the Ethereum split. In 2016, it began to collect capital to support startups that wanted to operate on the basis of blockchain technologybut they had a problem with financing their projects. To this end, he issued DAO tokens, which were paid for in Ethereum. In just one month, ETH 11,5 million was collected, which in mid-2016 were worth around USD 139 million. More than 18 have been invested in them. people.

It quickly turned out, however, that the DAO smart contract contained a number of security gaps. This was officially reported by developers who detected them. They also asked not to invest in DAO for now until the patches to fix these holes were implemented. They did not make it. Two days after their publication, which could even be treated as an instruction, one user took over 3,6 million ETH, which was then valued at almost $ 54 million.

Stole? Not completely. He used a bug in smartcontract, certainly not acting ethically, but formally he did not break the law. Ultimately, the divided cryptocurrency community decided that it could have the right to the acquired units, because it "only" took advantage of the developers' glare. However, the Ethereum Foundation did not agree, which decided to make a move unheard of in the world of cryptocurrencies: it canceled transactions. This outraged more people than the ETH acquisition itself, as the finality of the transaction is taken very seriously in the crypto world. As a result, on 25.10.2016/XNUMX/XNUMX there was a hard fork. Those who relied on the belief that the code was the law and everything was legal took over the existing chain, which they renamed Ethereum Classic (ETC), and the supporters of the reversal along with the Ethereum Foundation split off and remained with the name Ethereum.

Technical aspects of Ethereum Classic

The number of Ethereum Classic units is 210. Thanks to digging with the Ethash hash function (similar to ETH), ETC is currently one of the most profitable for mining cryptocurrencies. It can be obtained even with the help of graphics cards. You will now receive 700 ETC for each excavated block.

Ethereum Classic

Ethereum Classic is currently listed on 98 cryptocurrency exchanges around the world. As at 31.03.2020/4,96/116,3, the price is USD 576,5, which with 21.12.2017 million units gives capitalization exceeding USD 47,77 million. The highest ETC price was reached on December XNUMX, XNUMX, when USD XNUMX had to be paid for one unit.