Changpeng Zhao is Binance’s CEO and founder. And Binance is the world’s largest and most influential cryptocurrency exchange in the world, so when Mr. Zhao speaks, the cryptosphere listens. It’s much like how the world pays attention to every word that comes out of the Fed’s president when it comes to Forex and fiat currencies, primarily the USD.
Craig Wright
Another character in this article is none other than Craig Wright. This is a complex and cantankerous character which has some degree of charisma. He’s a very divisive figure in the cryptocurrency environment. He’s claimed to be Satoshi Nakamoto himself, he’s the man who got the whole “Ripple as a security” controversy started, and he likes to speak loudly against any cryptocurrency he disapproves of (and the list is long). Not too long ago, Craig attacked Tron, too.
His latest exploit was to create enough tension within the Bitcoin Cash project so that the project had to split (fork) into Bitcoin Cash ABC and Bitcoin Cash SV. The SV (BSV) version has not performed very well since the original (BTC ABC recovered quickly from a drop in price). That puts a dent on Mr. Wright credibility since that’s the blockchain project he currently leads for all practical purposes.
How the latest clash between CZ and Craig started
Keeping up with his established character, Mr. Wright went after the Twitter user that came up with the Lighting Torch initiative, who goes by Hodlnaut. Mr. Hodlnaut called Mr. Wright a fraud in a Tweet because he insists on being the real Satoshi Nakamoto.
The controversial crypto personality must have taken this comment in a very personal way (which is rather strange as lots of cryptonauts have expressed similar or worse opinions about the man) and declared open season on the Twitter user. He’s offering USD 5.000,00 in BSV for any information regarding Hodlnaut’s true identity.
The community hasn’t reacted very favorably to Mr. Wright’s initiative, and the hashtag #WeAreAllHodlonaut has popped out in Twitter to express support for the Twitter user (whose account is now deleted).
Hodlonaut was indeed very vocal about his opinions about the BSV founder. He called him “a very sad and pathetic scammer. Clearly mentally ill” and he also played a role in creating the #CraigWrightIsAFraud hashtag.
Things are getting so hot that even Wright’s lawyer had to come forward and speak on behalf of his client. He defended him by saying that “has not fraudulently claimed to be Satoshi Nakamoto” because he is Satoshi Nakamoto.
His statement also says that he wrote the now legendary Bitcoin white paper, completed the first Bitcoin transaction, and was pivotal for the network’s growth and development. And he now wants Hodlnaut to offer him an apology and to acknowledge his allegations as false.
Hodlnaut is not alone at all in his views about Mr. Wright. This person is widely known as “faketoshi” in the crypto verse. As shown in the above tweet, according to WikiLeaks, he’s “a proven serial forger of documents claiming that he is the inventor of Bitcoin.” Motherboard news published an article almost four years ago in which he denounced the “proof” Wright provided for Bitcoin’s authorship. It said that they were “probably backdated and point to a hoax.”
But for some reason, Craig Wright has chosen to pick on an anonymous (and influential) former Twitter user to vent his anger about the community’s doubts. And that’s not all.
Mr. Wright’s problems do not start and finish in the virtual world. He faces a USD 4 billion lawsuit against him for stealing (allegedly) about 1.1 million BTC from the late David Kleinman’s estate. Mr. Klainman was a crypto developer when it was just getting started.
And last December a researcher reported that the Bitcoin SV allows for tokens to be spent twice which is equivalent to say that it’s utterly useless as a genuinely useful cryptocurrency.
So when you put all of the information in the previous paragraphs together, it’s no wonder that lots of people in the cryptosphere are sick and tired of Craig Wright’s antics. Which brings us back to Binance and its CEO.
Binance’s warning
Mr. Zhao announced last Thursday that he’s ready to delist BSV from Binance if the controversial founder doesn’t change his ways. The community reacted by supporting Mr. Zhao’s position and encouraging other cryptocurrency exchange platforms to do the same and stop supporting the BSV coin.
That could be a possibly fatal blow for a blockchain project that’s already facing bad times and that. And guess what, Binance CEO did not take long take an action after the warning.
The ball is in Craig Wright’s court, of course. It will be fascinating to see how he decides to manage this situation.
Image courtesy of Pixabay.
Disclaimer: The presented information is subjected to market condition and may include the very own opinion of the author. Please do your ‘very own’ market research before making any investment in cryptocurrencies. Neither the writer nor the publication (TronWeekly.com) holds any responsibility for your financial loss.