Bitcoin Cash ABC rebrands to ‘eCash’, embraces proof-of-stake — and 2 decimal places

Bitcoin Cash ABC (BCHA), the embattled cryptocurrency project that has forked away from both Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash, has rebranded to eCash (XEC).The project’s re-launch will see it integrate proof-of-stake consensus layer “Avalanche,” introducing staking and greatly increasing the speed of transactions.eCash will also reduce its decimal places down from eight to two, with lead developer, Amaury Sechet, stating:“No other money has eight decimal places. Why should crypto? Cryptocurrencies with a lower unit price also enjoy higher bull market appreciation. Because the eCash team is incentivized by both tech and price improvement, this improvement was a no-brainer.”With the upgrade, all users’ BCHA coins will be converted to XEC at a ration of one-to-one million.Chinese crypto media, Wu Blockchain, noted the project plans to support EVM-compatibility, signalling eCash hopes to interoperate with Ethereum’s burgeoning DeFi sector.Bitcoin ABC proponent, Joannes Vermorel, articulated five core missions for the project — ensuring transactions are anonymous, immutable, low cost, and secure in less than three seconds, and maintaining infrastructure as “a public good funded through the coin social contract.”Related: Bitcoin Cash price jumps 68%: Looming hard fork to boost BCH user base?Bitcoin Cash ABC experienced a rocky ride after emerging as the minority chain after November 2020’s Bitcoin Cash fork. The rest of the community did not accept Sechet’s move to redistribute 8% of newly mined coins to a wallet under his control to fund development. This was implemented into ABC in November.According to CoinmarketCap, Bitcoin Cash is currently the 12th-largest crypto asset with a capitalization of $9.2 billion, while Bitcoin Cash ABC ranks 217th with a market cap of $587 million.