As we make our way through Q4 2020, several cryptocurrency projects are making upgrades to their platforms and other changes that could arouse the interest of the broader cryptocurrency community. With all eyes on Bitcoin and Ethereum, this week’s selection of top 3 coins to watch aims to shine a light on some smaller market cap cryptocurrencies, which look set for some interesting price action.
1. Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
Bitcoin Cash is a hard fork of the world’s largest cryptocurrency – Bitcoin. It started out on August 1, 2017 following a dispute regarding block size among Bitcoin developers. Bitcoin Cash supporters, led by Roger Ver, pushed for a larger block size limit in order to facilitate more transactions. Bitcoin Cash blockchain thus features an 8 MB block size and can handle up to 116 transactions per second (TPS).
BCH Hard Fork Expected to take place on November 15
Due to a disagreement among Bitcoin Cash developers regarding the allocation of BCH for future protocol development funding, Bitcoin Cash is expected to undergo a hard fork around November 15. Already in August, a group called Bitcoin Cash ABC (BCH ABC) proposed a protocol update, which includes a rule that 8% of mined BCH would be distributed to Bitcoin ABC developers in order to finance ongoing protocol development. However, Roger Ver and Bitcoin Cash Node (BCHN) were against this change, leading to the only possible solution to address the wishes of both sides – a hard-fork. It appears that Bitcoin Cash Node will prevail, though:
“At the present time, over 70% of blocks are signalling for Bitcoin Cash Node while less than 1% are signalling for Bitcoin Cash ABC, so Bitcoin Cash Node looks like it will be the dominant chain by far.”
BCH holders are advised to keep an eye on the developments around the hard-fork and move their coins to a personal wallet under their control, although some of the leading exchanges such as Binance, Huobi and OKEx have announced that their exchange wallets will support the chain fork. Kraken exchange announced that it will be supporting the Bitcoin Cash Node regardless of the outcome, but as far as Bitcoin Cash ABC is concerned, it will be supported only if hashpower on the ABC network is at least 10% of the hashpower on the Bitcoin Cash Node network. Definitely worth to follow the event, especially if you are already a holder of BCH.
2. Stratis (STRAX)
Stratis is a blockchain environment and a cryptocurrency for enterprise users. With a focus on the financial industry, the project aims to offer its customers an easy way to build blockchain-based solutions. Stratis supports the native C# programming language, which is already widely used, and therefore acts as a simple bridge to blockchain technology.
Stratis Mainnet Release to take place on November 12
The team behind the Stratis project has announced that their mainnet will finally be released on November 12. The updated and renamed STRAX Blockchain will include several new features, including support for the development and deployment of DeFi smart contracts. Even though the name of the project will stay the same, holders are required to swap their STRAT tokens for STRAX tokens, which will be the medium of exchange on the mainnet. Users must swap their tokens until November 12 at 9 AM GMT as STRAX tokens that remain unclaimed in this swap window will be irreversibly destroyed in October 2021. More information regarding the token swap can be found here.
3. PChain (PI)
PCHAIN is the world’s first native multichain system, which features the support for Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM). It consists of one main chain and multiple derived chains and the consensus is reached based on the patented PDBFT algorithm, which has significantly reduced the cost of communication. The smart contracts of PCHAIN can be easily invoked with other non-native Tokens (BCH, ERC20). Much like Stratis, third-party developers, including corporations and financial institutions, can build smart contract-enabled applications atop PChain.
First Monthly Token Burn Following the Successful Mainnet Update
PChain’s team completed a successful Mainnet upgrade in October and is set to conduct its fourth monthly token burn. The burn, which will destroy 50 million PI tokens is scheduled to take place on November 15. After November’s burn, the team has 6 more to go, as they plan to continue burning the tokens, until destroy a total of 500 million tokens. Around 2.6% of the total supply is forever removed out of circulation during each burn. In addition, the team has just confirmed the launch of their mobile wallet application for iOS. Android users will sadly have to wait a bit longer, but PChain assures that the wallet will be made available for download in Google Play store soon as it is already being reviewed. Furthermore, Epoch 17 delegation and voting process is scheduled to end this week, with the vote results being publicly announced by November 10.
