BTCC Mining Pool Stops Signaling for SegWit2x

More and more signs are pointing to the SegWit2x hard fork not taking place in November of this year. After F2Pool pulled its support, it appears BTCC is doing the same. The mining pool mined several blocks in a row which did not signal for SegWit2x, which is an intriguing development. It remains unclear how this will affect the chances of SegWit2x, but it seems things are slowly starting to fall apart as the deadline draws near.

What is the Future of SegWit2x?

A few weeks ago, well before all the recent drama started to unfold, we pondered the future of SegWit2x as a whole. At the time, there did not appear to be a legitimate reason for this hard fork to carry on. After all, the Bitcoin network had received its SegWit update. People looking for bigger block sizes could use Bitcoin Cash, which is doing well enough on its own. There is no reason to merge both concepts into one at this point.

It appears some mining pools agree with this sentiment. F2Pool has already pulled out of the requirement to signal for SegWit2x moving forward. The pool’s operator confirmed that he had only agreed to the New York Agreement to ensure that SegWit would activate on the Bitcoin network. There was never any real intent to support SegWit2x, as this hard fork provides no significant updates and certainly does not have economic support from the community at this stage. That situation will not be changing soon, by the looks of things.

The BTCC mining pool has now stopped signaling for SegWit2x as well. BTCC mined a few blocks in quick succession which did not signal for SegWit2x. To many people, this is only a sign of things to come. It is not unlikely more mining pools would renege on their support for SegWit2x as well. Now that Bitcoin has Segregated Witness, there is no reason for a 2x solution on top of it.

It is still possible we will see a SegWit2x hard fork in November, as there is some support from other mining pools for this solution. However, all of these companies are signaling only the intent to support SegWit2x come November. This does not mean all of these pools will support this hard fork when it activates on the network. BitFury is another pool rumored to pull its support for 2X in the future, although that has not been officially confirmed.

Over on the /r/BTC subreddit, the comments regarding this situation are not too kind. That is not entirely surprising, as that particular community is as anti-Bitcoin Core as it can get. Any decision that positively affects Bitcoin Core will be scrutinized by some community members. Discussions like these are usually pointless, since anyone can support whichever scaling solution they want moving forward. That does not mean the rest of the Bitcoin ecosystem will agree upon this version of the blockchain, though.

Even with BTCC pulling out for the time being, the SegWit2x solution still has plenty of mining support. At last check, the intention to signal SegWit2x still sat at around 94.2% of blocks, which is a lot higher than most would have assumed. That number included support from BTCC, though, as the statistics have yet to update.  It will be interesting to see how this situation evolves over the coming weeks and months.