Bitcoin Cash (BCH), the cryptocurrency that emerged as a controversial Bitcoin fork in 2017, is making noise as it soars to its highest price in almost three years. According to data from CoinGecko, the coin has experienced a significant increase of approximately 28% in the past week and 43% in the past 30 days.
BCH rose intraday from just above $600 to a daily peak of around $697 before falling back to its current price of $641. While this high price represents the highest price point for BCH since November 2021, it is still significantly below the all-time high of approximately $3,786 recorded in December 2017.
The recent increase in BCH's price is attributed to two main factors.
First, the anticipation surrounding the upcoming Bitcoin Cash halving, which is scheduled to occur in just two days, has contributed to the bullish sentiment. The halving event, which reduces mining block rewards by 50%, is expected to slow inflation and increase the rarity of the coin. Historically, such events lead to significant price increases, as evidenced by Bitcoin's (BTC) post-halving performance.
Bitcoin's own halving will occur on April 19. Both BTC and BCH's halving dates are set to the same block height, but a change in the mining algorithm increased the mining rate of BCH, resulting in a different halving date. Currently, BCH is expected to experience a halving on April 3, Bitcoin Satoshi Vision (BSV) on September 8, and Bitcoin Gold (BTG) on April 23.
BCH halving is expected to take place on April 3 around 10:27 Türkiye time. However, the Bitcoin halving will probably occur around 01:30 on April 19th.
Secondly, BCH came into the spotlight following the publication of a book by Roger Ver, who is now a leading figure in the BCH space, reigniting discussions about Bitcoin Cash and the philosophy behind Bitcoin. Blockstream CEO Adam Back's call for Ver to abandon BCH and join Bitcoin, although it has since been rejected, could fuel the debate and potentially introduce BCH to newcomers.
*This is not investment advice.