Bitcoin Knots developer claims exchanges are selling “fake bitcoins” after hard fork

Bitcoin Knots developer Luke Dashjr alleges that major cryptocurrency exchanges are listing and trading a version of Bitcoin that he considers counterfeit following a recent hard fork that introduced a BLAKE2b‑based chain.

Background to the fork

The fork, announced on September 1, replaced the original SHA‑256 proof‑of‑work algorithm with BLAKE2b, rendering existing ASIC miners incompatible. Dashjr, who stepped down as chairman and CTO of mining pool OCEAN before the split, now leads CONVOY Mining and promotes the new BLAKE2b chain as the legitimate Bitcoin ledger.

Accusations against exchanges

In a thread on X, Dashjr criticized exchanges for not running their own full nodes and for continuing to list the SHA‑256 chain, which he calls “Spamcoin.” He suggested that listing the original chain amounts to selling “fake bitcoins,” unless the practice is intentional fraud.

Market response

To date, no major exchange has added the forked coin to its order books. A minor venue listed the token under the ticker BTCB2, where bids briefly reached $82, but the bid‑ask spread exceeded 130 %, indicating negligible demand. Bitcoin (BTC) itself traded around $80,670, up 3.83 % in the past 24 hours.

Mining support

Miner participation in the BLAKE2b fork has been minimal. Signaling for the BIP‑110 fork peaked at 2.53 %, far below the 55 % threshold required for activation. An earlier attempt in August failed after two blocks, and since the September split the hash rate on the new chain has continued to decline.

Outlook

Dashjr remains one of the few public advocates for the BLAKE2b chain. The longevity of his “fake bitcoins” claim will depend on whether any miners beyond his own supporters continue to secure the forked network.