*Completed: November 27, 2018; Link for the latest update here

Updated: November 13, 2018

At November 16th 12:40 am, Philippine time, the Bitcoin Cash network will undergo a set of scheduled protocol upgrades, planned changes that were outlined several months ago in the official Bitcoin Cash roadmap.

Unlike prior scheduled network upgrades, this fork includes competing technical proposals between at least two groups, Bitcoin ABC and Bitcoin SV. If the competing proposals are not resolved prior to the time of the scheduled upgrade, the differences in code will result in a hard fork, potentially splitting the Bitcoin Cash protocol into more than one token.

While there are early forecasts as to which proposal will gain broader industry support, it is not yet clear (based on hash power, value, industry adoption) which proposal will become the dominant BCH chain. Coins.ph intends to support a single version of BCH and will monitor the situation closely to determine which chain to support as the primary version.

On November 15th at 10:00 pm Philippine time (more than 2 hours before the scheduled fork time), in order to protect customer funds, the Coins team plans to:

Suspend all sending, receiving, and conversion functionality on the Coins.ph BCH Wallet

Halt all BCH trading on Coins Pro (BCH-PHP and BCH-BTC markets) and cancel any open BCH-related orders

Service will be reinstated on both platforms once it is clear that the protocol upgrade is in a stable state.

At the moment of the fork, the Coins team will save a record of customer BCH balances. In the event that the minority fork produces tokens that are deemed to have long-term viability, Coins.ph would consider whether or not it would be feasible to return these funds to customers, as we have done with certain forks in the past. The viability of any tokens resulting from minority BCH proposals during this fork will be assessed based on its broader industry support, hash power, and value.

Remember that BCH and other cryptocurrencies have a long history of volatility, and that the safest way to protect oneself from price uncertainty is to convert your BCH to PHP in advance of the split. Furthermore, if you want full control of your BCH, including immediate access to any potential fork tokens, you may also consider moving your Bitcoin Cash to an external wallet that allows you to hold your own private keys (although that also comes with its own set of risks).

If you have any questions, please reach out to our team at help@coins.ph. Thanks.

Sincerely,

The Coins.ph Team