One of the more popular cryptocurrencies, Litecoin (LTC), experienced a 40% appreciation between Tuesday night to Wednesday afternoon in mid-February 2018. The currency surged past the psychological $200 mark, a stark contrast to the rut digital currencies have been stuck in for the past month.
Some sources seem to suggest the sudden rise in valuation is due to an upcoming “hard fork” in the currency. For those unfamiliar with the term, a hard fork is when a single cryptocurrency splits into two separate currencies. Bitcoin experienced a few hard fork in the past year, which created Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Bitcoin Gold (BTG).
LTC is going to be experiencing a similar event during its 1,371,111th block. When the cryptocurrency reaches this block, LTC owners will receive 10 Litecoin Cash (LCC) for everyone 1 LTC they possess.
Hard forks can occur due to differences in ideology between software developers. Such was the case with Bitcoin developers. However, LCC is not associated with the original creators of Litecoin. In fact, LTC creator, Charlie Lee, believes LCC is a scam. Lee recently tweeted “Any forks that you hear about is a scam trying to confuse you to think it’s related to Litecoin, don’t fall for it and definitely don’t enter your private keys or seed into their website or client.”
The creators of LCC have dismissed this claim, saying their coin will be an improved version of Litecoin. LCC will be equipped with a new algorithm that allows currency miners to adjust mining difficulty every block. Litecoin currently only allows adjustments every 2016 blocks.
The launch date announcement made by Litepay may also have been responsible for the surge. Litepay, Inc. claims that its technology will enable businesses to easily accept Litecoin payments. The transaction fees will be only 1%, which is favorable when compared to most credit card rates. This technology is set to be launched February 26th, according to a tweet made by the company.
However, there seems to be quite a bit of confusion over the legitimacy over LCC. Being that Mr. Lee has been very vocal to the fact that the original Litecoin team is not planning a hard fork, the situation does seem a little strange. Investors seem to not be as concerned over the legitimacy aspect of Litecoin Cash.
Article By: Frank Marino-Moore
