Scream the words “Bitcoin Cash” in a room full of crypto enthusiasts and you’ll see all hell break loose. The room will split into two sides, each screaming and cursing the other. One side will claim that Bitcoin Cash is the OG Bitcoin, the one that stayed true to the original Satoshi vision. The other side will respond saying that Bitcoin Cash is a scam that was created as a hard fork of Bitcoin and everyone should stay away from it. While they both present some decent points, pro-Bitcoin Cash side is currently gloating, as the coin has been doing pretty well recently.
After dropping off pretty hard in the post-January downtrend, it has recorded a solid period of accumulation in early April. The accumulation was over by April 11th when BCH started rapidly ascending, from $630ish lows going all the way up to $1700 in under a month’s time. The rise has been so meteoric that its market cap shot up to $28.57 billion, putting pressure on the third best coin in terms of market cap XRP (which clocks at a solid $31.44 billion).
The recent surge in Bitcoin Cash price should probably be attributed to its upcoming hard fork which will happen on May 15th. The Bitcoin Cash network will receive an upgrade which will see its block size increase from 8 MB to 32 MB. The update will also bring smart contract creation capabilities to the BCH network.
A larger block size means that the network will have a better transaction throughput which should help it on its way to commercial adoption. Smart contracts mean that Bitcoin Cash will become a suitable platform for people to develop Dapps on. With its improved block size it should have transactions that will be faster and more scalable than Ethereum, currently the main Dapp platform out there. The upgrade will improve Bitcoin Cash and make it very versatile and its developers hope this will encourage further adoption.
Investors should feel encouraged by the upcoming fork, as BCH price is likely to keep moving on an upwards trend. The day of the fork could see some “buy the rumor, sell the news” type of action that could down the price. Still, the general sentiment is that long-term this coin will keep growing. Most of this latest drive seems to be led by Asian volume, as BCH is very popular there. So whether you love it or hate it, doesn’t matter; what matters is that you love crypto gains and investing in Bitcoin Cash should bring you some of those in the following period.