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Twenty eighteen has been a roller coaster ride for the cryptocurrency market with price surges and market crashes. This price play went hand in hand with multiple feuds between eminent personalities within the crypto sphere. The online fallout was met with a lot of engagement by holders as well as enthusiasts who made sure they protect the cryptocurrencies they wanted to propagate and push into the mainstream realm.
Tone Vays and Nouriel ‘Dr.Doom’ Roubini
The first confrontation on the list is a direct engagement between Bitcoin proponent Tone Vays and economist Nouriel Roubini. Vays, an active Twitter user had asked user opinions on a certain haircut that he should get, to which Roubini replied by taking a not-so-subtle dig at Bitcoin [BTC].
VitalikButerin and Justin Sun
The clash between the Ethereum co-founder and the Tron Foundation CEO has been a prolonged event, one that stemmed from both the personalities pointing out flaws in each other’s network. Vitalik had said that there is no opportunity for another 1000-times growth in anything in the cryptocurrency and blockchain space anymore.
According to him, in the past 5-6 years, the growth of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology was because of the marketing, which is now closing towards a dead end. Justin Sun had retaliated by stating that Tron can surpass Ethereum on the basis of transactions any day.
Bitmain’s Jihan Wu and Craig ‘Faketoshi’ Wright
The Bitcoin Cash hard fork was one of the most talked about events in the crypto sphere, something that resulted in the cryptocurrency splitting into two separate tokens: Bitcoin SV and Bitcoin ABC.
Jihan Wu, the CEO of Bitmain, was one of the biggest proponents for Bitcoin ABC while Craig Wright was the same for Bitcoin SV. The insults between the two had gotten serious at the peak of the hard fork, with Wu even calling Craig Wright a spy for Blockstream.
Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao and Vitalik Buterin
Buterin seems to be in the eye of a lot of cryptocurrency storms with the Ethereum co-founder also involved with Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao. CZ had directly talked about Vitalik, asking him to have a big heart and wish everyone in the crypto space well. He said:
“Don’t get me wrong, I am all for blockchain/decentralization/freedom. But i would not wish “burn in hell” on anyone or anything. That’s not a nice thing to say, even if it was said by Vitalik. I didn’t bother asking him yet, I assume he just meant he dont like centralization, which is fine. We need to keep a view of moving the entire eco-system forward, not just one part of it over another”
John McAfee and SEC
Regulatory issues have been a cause of concern for the industry with several bigwigs mentioning it multiple times. John McAfee, one of the more flamboyant Twitter users had directly engaged with the Securities and Exchange Commission [SEC], mainly focusing on its Chairman Jay Clayton’s comments on ICO’s. McAfee had tweeted:
“The head of the SEC declared today that all ICOs are securities. While I STRONGLY disagree and believe that the majority of ICOs do not meet the Supreme Court Howey Test for securities, I will submit, for now, to their rules and will not work with future ICOs. But, I’ll be back.”
John McAfee and HitBTC
McAfee was in the news again when he singled out HitBTC, a popular cryptocurrency exchange by stating that exchanges were responsible for the deterioration of the crypto sphere. He had tweeted:
“Hitbtc, for example, has increased suffering for millions of poor people who cannot afford the minimum buy-in since it is greater than their monthly income. Boycott them.”
He also tweeted:
“@hitbtc I will be your worst enemy until you prove that you are aligned with our community and are truly interested in helping the poor. You have not done shit to help access the only free healthcare in the world.”
The above mentioned ‘tweet-wars’ are an example of a burgeoning industry waiting to capitalize on the interest generated by these controversies. 2019 looks to be another year dotted with more happenings and investors and holders alike are waiting with bated breath to see what will happen.