During a recent episode of the Show Me The Crypto podcast, Roger Ver, a well-known investor and advocate of Bitcoin Cash (BCH), expressed his belief that Ethereum, not Bitcoin, will attract the majority of new users to the world of cryptocurrencies. Despite acknowledging Ethereum’s scalability challenges and the emergence of similar layer-one platforms, Ver emphasized that the Ethereum ecosystem remains the most active and influential:
“Despite not having the largest market capitalization compared to Bitcoin, I firmly believe that Ethereum is leading the way in driving global adoption.”
Ver commended the growing prominence of Ethereum Virtual Machine-compatible (EVM) blockchains and layer-2 scaling solutions like Polygon (MATIC) that offer effective mechanisms for alleviating the burden on the Ethereum main chain. These developments enable the distribution of workload, reducing strain and enhancing the overall scalability of the Ethereum network.
Roger Ver’s Insights: Ethereum’s Rise to Prominence
Ver recounts the historical “civil war” that unfolded during the early stages of Bitcoin, involving a conflict between Vitalik Buterin, co-founder of Ethereum, and the core developers of Bitcoin.
According to Ver, disagreements regarding the utilization of smart contracts and the divergence from the notion of blockchains solely serving as currency or stores of value ultimately led Vitalik Buterin to develop Ethereum. Ver highlighted that if not for the scaling dispute within Bitcoin, all those advancements would have been integrated into the Bitcoin network.
However, due to what Ver described as animosity from Bitcoin core developers towards Buterin, he was compelled to create Ethereum, a decision that Ver commended. Ver also expressed his disappointment with the controversial Ledger Recover service during the discussion. The service allows users to store their encrypted seed phrases with external custodians to mitigate the risk of loss.
While Ver acknowledged that it’s acceptable for individuals to opt for custodial accounts and key recovery, he emphasized that the core ethos of cryptocurrencies revolves around maintaining complete control over one’s assets at all times.
In January, Roger Ver faced a lawsuit filed by a trading unit of Genesis, a crypto lending company, for his alleged failure to settle approximately $20.8 million in unresolved cryptocurrency options. Ver asserted in a Reddit post during that time that he possessed enough funds to cover the outstanding amount. However, he argued that since Genesis was no longer financially solvent, he was not obligated to fulfill his part of the agreement from a legal standpoint.
In the previous year, Roger Ver attracted attention due to accusations of failing to fulfill a debt. Mark Lamb, the CEO of CoinFLEX, asserted that Ver owed the company $47 million in USD Coin (USDC) and cited a written contract to support the claim. However, on June 28, Ver refuted these allegations without explicitly mentioning CoinFLEX.