Briefly
- LayerTwo Labs CEO Paul Sztorc has proposed a Bitcoin laborious fork known as eCash.
- The fork would clone and “reassign” cash linked to Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto and provides them to eCash buyers.
- Earlier Bitcoin and Ethereum laborious forks have been far much less profitable than the originals long-term.
Bitcoin developer Paul Sztorc has proposed a tough fork that may reassign a few of the earliest cash on the unique crypto community—broadly believed to belong to pseudonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto—to buyers in a brand new challenge.
The co-founder and CEO of LayerTwo Labs, Sztorc introduced the challenge, known as eCash, on Friday. The plan would “manually reassign” about 500,000 of the roughly 1.1 million Bitcoin related to the so-called “Patoshi sample,” a mining sample some researchers consider is linked to Nakamoto.
“This may little doubt be a controversial resolution,” Sztorc wrote on X. “However I feel it’s essential, and in reality, supreme.”
Sztorc wouldn’t (and couldn’t) transfer the Satoshi-linked cash on Bitcoin itself. As a substitute, eCash would create a separate blockchain that copies Bitcoin’s historical past and modifications the ledger to assign all however 600K of these cash to new house owners. Present on-chain Bitcoin ($BTC) holders would additionally obtain cash on the eCash community equal to their holdings on the time of the fork.
Vital: I’ve additionally devised a approach that some can *make investments* on this hardfork, now, earlier than the fork-date, in August:
– Satoshi has 1.1M cash within the so known as “patoshi” sample.
– We will probably be manually reassigning a few of these cash (fewer than half) to buyers at the moment.This may…
— Paul Sztorc (@Truthcoin) April 24, 2026
“Your cash will cut up. For instance, you probably have 4.19 $BTC, then you’ll get 4.19 eCash,” he wrote on X. “Chances are you’ll promote your eCash—or hold it. Or ignore it!”
Named after the unique eCash, cryptographer David Chaum’s early digital cash challenge, the brand new fork is a callback to one among crypto’s earliest concepts. The unique eCash used cryptographic “blind signatures” to let individuals make non-public digital funds, however DigiCash, Chaum’s firm growing the challenge, filed for chapter in 1998 after the challenge failed to realize widespread adoption.
“It’s not Satoshi’s Bitcoin, it’s simply [unspent transaction outputs] which might be presumed to belong to Satoshi which might be being cloned and modified onto a totally totally different community,” Bitcoin developer and Casa Chief Safety Officer Jameson Lopp instructed Decrypt.
Lopp dismissed the transfer as a publicity stunt, calling it “intelligent outrage advertising and marketing.”
In line with Loop, such a reassignment might solely occur on Bitcoin itself if the broader community of builders agreed to undertake the fork.
“If your entire Bitcoin ecosystem determined emigrate to a tough fork that reassigned Satoshi’s cash to keys that different individuals managed, then positive, it’s theoretically doable,” Lopp mentioned.
Sztorc has mentioned the reassignment would enable early supporters to spend money on the challenge earlier than its deliberate August launch. He has argued the transfer is required to maintain the chain from changing into a “zombie” challenge with out sufficient capital or contributors.
Bitcoin has cut up earlier than. Bitcoin Money launched in 2017 after a dispute over scaling, splitting off and creating a brand new community. Ethereum cut up in 2016 after the DAO hack, with most community backers selecting to reverse the transactions with stolen funds whereas Ethereum Basic stored the unique chain. Each Bitcoin Money (BCH) and Ethereum Basic (ETC) have been far much less invaluable and standard than their respective unique cash and networks.
The eCash web site says the chain is anticipated to launch in about 119 days and can embrace “Drivechain” scaling community assist, with seven sidechains in growth.
“The upside is gigantic: world scalability, privateness, competitors, fast enchancment, and adoption,” Sztorc wrote on the eCash web site. “In actual fact, it might be a matter of life or loss of life for Bitcoin. The draw back is small: some drama, plus each Bitcoiner will get some free cash.”
Sztorc didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark by Decrypt.
