Meet Bitcoin Cash—the new digital-currency that surged 122% in less than a day

There is a brand-new entrant in digital currency.

So-called Bitcoin Cash, which erupted out of the original bitcoin on Tuesday, is the result of a small faction of bitcoin developers’ demand for a version of the popular cryptocurrency that allows virtual miners, which support the currency, to more rapidly process transactions in larger units known as blocks.

A single Bitcoin Cash token is worth $626 after charging 122% in less than 24 hours.

Its emergence comes as the original bitcoin is undergoing a separate fork, known as BIP 91 — another widely backed solution to the so-called scaling problem that expands the bitcoin network without creating a separate version. The existence of parallel versions, has created some confusion in the cyber-unit industry and threatens to rattle bitcoin participants, if only briefly.

The nascent Bitcoin Cash — it’s so new that, unlike most digital currencies, it doesn’t have a logo yet — comes as the industry is confronting growing pains, with a chorus of market participants urging for the adoption of software updates that would facilitate larger, speedier transactions.

Source: Coinmarketcap.com
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Bitcoin Cash is an attempt to solve processing issues by allowing blocks to be processed in 8-megabyte units, rather than the one-megabyte block the older version of bitcoin uses.

The split played out at 8:20 a.m. on Tuesday, according to btcforkmonitor.info, which a site developed to monitor this so-called “fork” in the world’s largest digital currency.

Read: Bitcoin tumbles as ‘split’ takes effect; Ether rebounds

Because Bitcoin Cash is supported by a minority of developers and industry specialists, its future is uncertain and it will likely be prone to volatility. The cybercurrency is presently backed by currency-mining and trading firm ViaBTC and Kraken Exchange, a San Francisco bitcoin exchange operator.

Meanwhile, a number of large digital currency exchanges, including Coinbase, have said they aren’t supporting Bitcoin Cash transactions — for the moment, at least. Still, that hasn’t stopped a rapid ascent for Bitcoin Cash.

According to digital-currency data firm coinmarketcap.com, Bitcoin Cash already is the third largest cryptocurrency in the world at a market value of $10 billion, just behind Ethereum’s Ether tokens, with a total value of $21 billion and the original at $45 billion.

Bitcoin BTCUSD, -0.66% meanwhile, was flat Tuesday at $2,750.32, according to a prominent industry site Coindesk.