Gemini, a United States cryptocurrency exchange, announced support for Bitcoin Cash (BCH) custody and trading through its official Medium blog on December 8. Full BCH trading is expected to begin on Monday, December 10.
Gemini, founded in 2015 by the Winklevoss brothers, now supports five cryptocurrencies, namely Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), Zcash (ZEC), and Bitcoin Cash (BCH).
The Bitcoin Fork
Gemini specified that its Bitcoin Cash support is limited to BCH ABC under the BCH ticker. As a result, all BCH withdrawals from Gemini will only be valid on the ABC blockchain, and any funds sent to the platform over the Bitcoin SV blockchain will be invalid and irrecoverable.
Gemini declared that they “are continuing to evaluate Bitcoin SV over the coming weeks or months, and we may or may not choose to support withdrawals and/or trading of Bitcoin SV in the future.”
Gemini said that the changes introduced by Bitcoin Cash have laid the groundwork for “further transaction throughput enhancements,” which was a major point of disagreement that led to last month’s contentious fork.
Bitcoin SV and Bitcoin ABC are the two blockchain networks that contended for the Bitcoin Cash name after a controversial hard fork. What was often referred to as a “war” in the crypto community ended when Bitcoin SV backer and billionaire entrepreneur Calvin Ayre declared that the chain no longer wanted the Bitcoin Cash name.
Safety First
Gemini’s vice president of engineering, Eric Winer, noted Gemini’s thoroughgoing “banking compliance and fiduciary obligations” under oversight from NYDFS (New York State Department of Financial Services). Winder stated that Litecoin trading support came as the result of close cooperation with regulators and that the exchange was approaching new assets with a “security-first” approach.
To ensure legal compliance, the company reportedly “worked closely with the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYSDFS) to obtain approval to offer Bitcoin Cash trading and custody services.”
Gemini claimed itself to be “the world’s most regulated cryptocurrency exchange and custodian.”
Gemini first announced that it would add bitcoin cash in March, prior to the hard fork. At the time, founders Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss also cited litecoin as a potential addition. The latter coin was officially listed in October.
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