eCash Rollout Sparks Exchange Freeze Concerns for Bitcoin Holders

The rollout of eCash, a new Bitcoin-derived chain, may cause temporary exchange freezes for some Bitcoin holders. GMO Coin has warned its customers that it may suspend several Bitcoin services when eCash takes its first balance snapshot at block 963,648 on August 23.

The event is currently being described as an Alpha stage issuing practice for the ECX asset by eCash's live roadmap. However, this description differs from earlier integration guides, which called block 963,648 the fork point and described a 1:1 ECX credit.

GMO Coin has not confirmed whether it will pause services during the Alpha snapshot, and its next notice is expected to provide more clarity on the situation.

eCash's rollout plan includes three stages: Alpha at block 963,648 (August 23), Beta at block 967,680 (September 20), and Mainnet at block 973,728 (October 31). During these stages, practice ECX will be credited to users' accounts, with permanent ECX arriving at the mainnet snapshot.