eCash fork to reassign Satoshi-linked coins draws criticism

A planned hard fork called eCash would create a new blockchain that copies Bitcoin’s history and issues matching balances on the new chain. The project is targeting an August launch.

The proposal would reassign roughly 1.1 million coins identified by analyses of early mining patterns known as the Patoshi pattern. Of those, 600,000 eCash tokens would be assigned to an account labeled “Satoshi” and about 500,000 would be reserved to seed the new network and attract contributors.

Paul Sztorc, founder and CEO of LayerTwoLabs, is leading the project. He has promoted a technical proposal known as BIP300/301 or Drivechains, which aims to let Bitcoin operate alongside sidechains that offer different features. Sztorc says eCash is intended as a testing ground for those features.

Under the plan, the Bitcoin ledger itself would not be altered. Instead, the new chain would replicate Bitcoin’s transaction history and create equivalent eCash balances for holders. The reassigned tokens would exist only on the eCash chain.

Sztorc posted on social media that the fork would not touch any existing Bitcoin balances: “We do not take any of Satoshi’s BTC. We gift Satoshi 600,000 eCash … BTC balances are untouched by eCash.” He also wrote that many early outputs appear inactive and that critics were overstating the impact, adding, “It is fun to virtue signal about property rights.”

Critics have raised ethical and ownership concerns about assigning value tied to addresses associated with Bitcoin’s pseudonymous creator. Opponents say reallocating tokens connected to those early addresses, even on a separate chain, could erode norms around dormant or abandoned funds. The plan notes that some of the seeded 500,000 eCash would go to early backers or investors, but it does not include a detailed distribution schedule.

Drivechains, the technical concept behind parts of Sztorc’s agenda, was first proposed in 2017 and has supporters among some early developers. The approach has not gained broad consensus in the wider Bitcoin community. Past hard forks, including the 2017 split that created Bitcoin Cash, altered protocol rules and produced separate chains.

Project details remain limited as debate continues among developers, investors and users. Organizers say the allocation of seeded tokens is intended to ensure developer interest and avoid a launch with little community activity. The timeline still lists August for the expected network start, subject to change.