Major cryptocurrency exchange Binance has announced on its website (Apr 15) that it will delist Bitcoin SV (BSV) and cease trades for all BSV trading pairs (under the ticket BCHSV) next week on April 22nd at 10:00 AM UTC. The move comes not long after BSV creator Craig Wright’s recent unwelcome behavior towards Hodlonaut, the Twitter user who started the Lightning Torch initiative, and appears to be a response to it.
Officially, however, the exchange has only said it is delisting BSV because the crypto no longer meets its standards. It said it conducts regular reviews “to ensure that it [an asset] continues to meet the high level of standard we expect. We believe this best protects all of our users.” Some of the factors it considers in deciding if a token sufficiently meets its requirements include response level to due diligence requests, the quality of a coin’s development, and – of particular note – “evidence of unethical/fraudulent conduct”.
The drama began unfolding when Wright first offered a bounty of $5,000 in BSV for information on the identity of Hodlonaut, prompting the crypto community to take to Twitter with the hashtag #WeAreAllHodlonaut against Wright. Hodlonaut has since deleted its Twitter account.
Wright holds something of an infamous reputation in the community for often claiming publicly that he is Satoshi Nakamoto, the moniker used by the mysterious unidentified person(s) who developed Bitcoin. Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao, informally known as CZ in the community, then also took to Twitter to denounce Wright’s behavior toward Hodlonaut. He tweeted, “Craig Wright is not Satoshi. Anymore of this sh!t, we delist!” Subsequently, #DelistBSV started being used by the community on Twitter.
Following the announcement, BSV is currently down on Binance by more than 12% at press time at around $55.
Another exchange has also decided to follow in Binance’s footsteps. ShapeShift’s CEO Erik Voorhees tweeted, “We stand with @binance and CZ’s sentiments. We’ve decided to delist Bitcoin SV #BSV from @ShapeShift_io within 48 hrs.” Kraken is also considering similar action.
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