BCH

Bitcoin Cash · Proof-of-work money (SHA-256 Bitcoin fork of 2017, minority hashrate)

51 /100

T5Impaired · #54 of 77

No engine yetStableReviewed Oct 23, 2026

Capped at T5: a lost fork of BTC, so security counts at most 1 and the tier cannot rise above Impaired.

DemandSoundnessDurability

9 of 4532 of 4010 of 15

Key facts

SupplyFloat 100% of issued supply

Circulating 20.1M, 96%
Not yet issued 893.0K, 4%
Max 21.0M

FDV / market cap

1.0x

$5.6B / $5.6B

Market cap

$5.6B

Price $276.55, 7d −1.5%

Market data: CoinGecko, Oct 24, 2026. Scores reviewed Oct 23, 2026.

Assessment

A fork that lost the contest it was created for: Bitcoin Cash split from Bitcoin in 2017 to become its payment chain, and Bitcoin kept the hashrate, users and value, so BCH's money use counts at most 1 here. Its cap, halving schedule and airdrop distribution are as clean as Bitcoin's, but it runs on ~0.35% of SHA-256 hashrate: a six-hour majority rents for tens of thousands of dollars, one client runs ~97% of nodes, and fees (~$50K a year) leave security to a subsidy that halves again in 2028. Use is thin (~12.5K transactions a day) and institutional access is an OTC trust whose ETF registration is not effective.

How value reaches holders

None by design: fees and the 3.125 BCH block subsidy go to miners; no burn, no staking. 21M hard cap with 20.11M issued (95.7%); issuance is ~450 BCH a day (~164K a year, 0.82% of supply) and halves at block 1,050,000 (~Apr 2028); changing it needs a hard fork that node operators adopt, and the 2020 attempt to send 8% of the coinbase to developers left with Bitcoin ABC as eCash (XEC). Fees are negligible (~$50K over the trailing year), so miner revenue (~$47M a year) is ~99.9% subsidy

Score anatomy

Demand

9 / 45: the stronger of two routes, plus adoption

Why would anyone hold it: does value reach the token, and is the network or product used today?

Holder routing engine input

All fees and the 3.125 BCH block subsidy go to miners by design; no burn, no staking

Nothing reaches holders by designhigh confidenceHow this is scored

Revenue reality engine input

Fees were ~$50K over the trailing year (DefiLlama, Oct 22, 2026): ~12,455 transactions a day at a ~$0.001 median fee (Blockchair, Oct 23, 2026)

Under $0.5M/yr, or emissions-subsidized onlyhigh confidenceHow this is scored

Monetary usage engine input

Niche payment rail: BitPay still settles BCH and the chain carries ~12,455 transactions a day at a ~$0.001 median fee (Blockchair, Oct 23, 2026); no measured volume beyond that

Measurable niche monetary use: payment rails, savings products, or collateral at third-party venues below the next levellow confidenceHow this is scored

Adoption ×3

Lost fork of BTC: ~12.5K tx/day and ~$50K fees TTM on ~0.35% of SHA-256 hashrate

Marginal or fading: negligible use for its size, usage down 60%+ year on year, or a lost forkhigh confidenceHow this is scored

Two routes, the stronger counts

Revenue 0, minus 5 for routing 0 = cash flow 0. Money use 2. The engine is the stronger route: 2.

Soundness

32 / 40

Can a long-term holder trust the rules: supply, float, distribution and control?

Supply discipline ×3

21M hard cap, 3.125 BCH a block since the Apr 2024 halving: ~164K BCH a year, 0.82% of supply, next halving ~Apr 2028; the 2020 plan to divert 8% to developers split off as eCash

Hard cap or net deflationary by protocol rule, under 1%/yr gross growth, and nobody can mint past the cap or change the schedule short of a hard fork node operators adopthigh confidenceHow this is scored

Float and unlocks ×1

All issued supply is liquid: 20.11M BCH with no locked, vested or treasury tranches; Satoshi-era coins are dormant, not held back by any organization

Fully vested, no scheduled unlockshigh confidenceHow this is scored

Distribution ×2

Forked Aug 1, 2017 to every BTC holder 1:1 with no premine, sale or dev fund; Bitcoin's own 2009 launch was open, and no organization directs BCH supply

No insider allocation of any kind, an open launch, and no organization directing supplyhigh confidenceHow this is scored

Decentralization and security ×2

Hashrate ~3.9 EH/s is 0.35% of Bitcoin's; renting 4 EH/s on NiceHash (~9.9 EH/s traded) for 6 hours costs ~$40K; BCHN runs ~97% of nodes; 10-block finality stops only deep reorgs

A halt, rollback or exploited consensus bug in the last 24 months, attack cost under $10M, or a foundation-selected validator set or small multisig can halt or upgrade with no meaningful exit windowhigh confidenceHow this is scored

Durability

10 / 15

Is it big, proven and reachable by institutions?

Scale ×1

$5.7B market cap (band 4), $165.1M/day median volume (band 4), no flags.

Major: $1-10B market cap and $50M/day+How this is scored

Track record ×1

9.2 years as a separate chain with two 94%+ drawdowns (2017-18, 2021-23); the May 2019 coordinated two-pool reorg and the 2018 and 2020 splits are outside the 5-year window

8-10 years and two such cyclesmedium confidenceHow this is scored

Institutional access ×1

Grayscale BCHG is an OTC trust (382,600 BCH, Jun 30, 2026); its S-3 to list on NYSE Arca (amended Sep 11, 2026) is not effective, so a US filing is pending

OTC trust, non-US product, or a pending US filinghigh confidenceHow this is scored

What would move it up

Capped at T5: a lost fork of BTC, so security counts at most 1 and the tier cannot rise above Impaired. The cap lifts only if the condition reverses; the gates below apply after that.

To reach T4 Speculative, every gate is met.

Supply 5gate 1(met)

Tier outlook

Stable

SHA-256 rental depth against BCH hashrate (~9.9 EH/s traded on NiceHash vs ~3.9 EH/s), and any deep reorg or double-spend
Grayscale BCHG's S-3 going effective with an NYSE Arca listing (access to 3)
Fee revenue as the subsidy halves at block 1,050,000 (~Apr 2028)
Measured payment volume (BitPay or merchant data)

Research report

Oct 23, 2026 · source confidence 80%

Bitcoin Cash is the 2017 fork of Bitcoin that kept Bitcoin's monetary rules and pursued larger blocks for everyday payments. Its supply design is as strict as Bitcoin's: a 21 million cap, issuance of about 0.82% a year after the April 2024 halving, and no premine, sale or developer fund. Every Bitcoin holder received coins one for one at the fork, and in 2020 the network chose a chain split over a proposal to send 8% of block rewards to developers. The weakness is security. Bitcoin Cash shares Bitcoin's SHA-256 algorithm but attracts only about 0.35% of its hashrate, so a majority of its hashing power for six hours can be rented for tens of thousands of dollars, and any large Bitcoin pool could redirect a small slice of its machines to overpower it. Nodes reject reorganizations deeper than ten blocks, which limits deep rewrites but not short ones. One client, Bitcoin Cash Node, runs about 97% of nodes. Use is modest, around 12,500 transactions a day with fees near a tenth of a cent, and fees total about $50,000 a year, so miners depend on a subsidy that halves again around April 2028. US access is an over-the-counter Grayscale trust whose ETF registration is not yet effective.

Structure (14 facts)

Chain: Bitcoin Cash L1: SHA-256 proof of work, 10-minute blocks, ASERT difficulty (aserti3-2d since Nov 2020), 32 MB adaptive block size limit; annual May upgrades (CashTokens May 2023, adaptive block size May 2024, VM limits and big integers May 2025). Block 974,175 on Oct 23, 2026
Genesis: Aug 1, 2017 hard fork from Bitcoin at block 478,558 (UAHF, Bitcoin ABC client); every BTC holder received BCH 1:1; no premine, sale or dev fund. Nov 2018 split from BSV; Nov 2020 split when Bitcoin ABC's 8% coinbase Infrastructure Funding Plan left as eCash (XEC) and BCHN's chain kept the name
Supply: 20,106,784 BCH issued of a 21M cap (95.7%; Blockchair, Oct 23, 2026)
Emission: 3.125 BCH a block since the Apr 2024 halving (block 840,000): ~450 BCH a day, ~164K a year, 0.82% of supply; next halving at block 1,050,000 (~Apr 2028)
Mint authority: none: coinbase pays miners only; changing the schedule needs a hard fork adopted by node operators
Distribution: no insider allocation of any kind: Bitcoin's 2009 open launch plus a fork airdrop to all holders; the Aug-Nov 2017 emergency difficulty adjustment let miners issue blocks faster than schedule, but through open mining. No organization directs supply
Security: hashrate ~3.9 EH/s (Blockchair 3.95, miningpoolstats 3.88) vs Bitcoin ~1,139 EH/s (0.35%). Pools (miningpoolstats, Oct 23, 2026): tpool.io 20.4%, ViaBTC 12.9%, AntPool 10.8%, ~29% unattributed. NiceHash SHA-256 market fills ~9.9 EH/s at ~0.45-0.50 BTC per EH a day, so 4 EH/s for 6 hours rents for ~$40K; Bitcoin's hashprice (~$32 per PH a day) puts the opportunity cost for any large BTC pool in the same range. BCHN rejects reorgs deeper than 10 blocks (DEFAULT_MAX_REORG_DEPTH = 10, 2-hour finalization delay), which caps deep rewrites but not shallow double-spends or censorship. Clients: BCHN ~97% of the ~550 BCH-chain nodes Blockchair sees (ABC-labelled nodes are eCash), BCH Unlimited 12 nodes; Knuth, Bitcoin Verde and Flowee exist at negligible share. No halts or reorgs found in the last 24 months; coordinated two-pool reorg (BTC.com, BTC.top) on May 15, 2019 to reverse SegWit-recovery thefts
Security budget: miner revenue ~$128K a day (~$47M a year, ~0.8% of market cap), ~99.9% subsidy
Value accrual: none to holders: fees and subsidy go to miners; no burn, no staking
Revenue: fees ~$50K over the trailing year (DefiLlama, Oct 22, 2026); ~12,455 transactions a day, average fee $0.007, median $0.001 (Blockchair, Oct 23, 2026)
Usage: payments niche: BitPay lists BCH; CashTokens live since May 2023; smartBCH sidechain TVL ~$39K (DefiLlama). No measured payment volume found
Liquidity: $154M a day of reported volume on a $5.72B market cap (CoinGecko, Oct 23, 2026); price $284.5, down 41% over the year and 92% below the Dec 2017 high
Institutional access: Grayscale Bitcoin Cash Trust (BCHG, OTCQX): 382,600 BCH and 47.1M shares on Jun 30, 2026, 2.5% fee; S-3 filed Sep 2025 and amended Sep 11, 2026 to list on NYSE Arca as Grayscale Bitcoin Cash Trust ETF, not effective, the filing citing NYSE Arca's pending generic listing standard; CME announced BCH futures (250 BCH standard, 25 BCH micro) for Oct 19, 2026, pending regulatory review; launch not confirmed from a primary source
Roadmap: annual May network upgrades by BCHN and other node teams; BCHN v29.2.0 released Oct 2026

Sources (14)

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