Coin Market

Bitcoiner PlanB slams ETH: ‘Centralized & premined’ shitcoin

Published

2 weeks ago

April 21, 2025

Pseudonymous Bitcoin stock-to-flow (S2F) model creator PlanB attacked Ethereum and mocked the project’s co-founder, Vitalik Buterin.

PlanB mockingly reposted a June 2022 X post by Buterin in which the Ethereum co-founder said S2F “is really not looking good now.” PlanB responded with a new posting stating, “Ethereum is really not looking good now.”

Source: PlanB

In his response to Buterin’s criticism from years ago, PlanB claimed Ethereum and the network’s coin, Ether (ETH), are centralized and premined, pointing to its shift to proof-of-stake (PoS) and changes in its issuance rate. He said that those features “are harmful and deserve all the mockery they get,” echoing Buterin’s old comment about S2F.

PlanB’s criticism of Ethereum

In a separate X post, PlanB explained that an Ethereum full node requires nine terabytes of disk space, meaning he “can not run it” on his hardware. The kind of node in question is probably an Ethereum archival node, which, according to Etherscan data, requires over 21.8 terabytes (TB) with the Geth client.

An Ethereum full node running the Geth client that prunes older states with the default settings requires 1.28 TB, according to Etherscan data. The Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum communities have long debated what constitutes a full node.

This type of pruned node cannot access the full historical data or generate Merkle proofs for old blocks, which limits its research and bug-finding applications. Still, such nodes can engage in full trustless block and transaction validation.

Bitcoin’s full nodes require under 700 gigabytes (0.7 terabytes), according to Statista data, and also require much less computing power. This means that users can run Bitcoin full nodes much more easily, leading to a higher node count and higher network decentralization.

Not everyone views the criticism as founded. Jeremiah O’Connor, chief technology officer and co-founder at crypto cybersecurity firm Trugard, told Cointelegraph:

“PlanB’s take is classic Bitcoin maxi energy — loud, confident and missing half the picture.“

O’Connor explained that Ethereum and Bitcoin serve two different purposes. He said that “Ethereum nodes are bigger and more complex” since Ether “isn’t just digital gold — it’s a full-on global computer.”

“Of course it’s heavier.“

He conceded that users relying on centralized data providers like Infura is a problem. Still, he claimed that every ecosystem engages in centralization tradeoffs and that Ethereum developers are working to address the issue, and “it’s evolving fast.”

“Calling ETH a “shitcoin” because it’s not Bitcoin is like calling smartphones a scam because they aren’t landlines,“ he said.

He added that the two are different tools with differing purposes. He views Bitcoin as a “rock-solid value storage” and Ethereum as “where the builders are,” and said that “both matter” and “complement each other.”

Buterin as a “single point of failure”

PlanB also questioned Buterin’s influence on Ethereum’s development, calling him a “single point of failure.” However, Ethereum Foundation co-executive director Tomasz Stańczak recently announced that Buterin is stepping back from day-to-day operations to focus on research.

PlanB also raised an issue with Ethereum rolling back transactions following the 2016 DAO hack:

“The fact that this is even possible should worry you.“

Bybit CEO Ben Zhou suggested an Ethereum rollback following the exchange’s $1.4 billion hack. Still, many in the community argued that a rollback happening now, with Ethereum being a more mature network, would be next to impossible.

Bitcoin itself had a comparable incident in its early history as well. On Aug. 15, 2010, an exploit resulted in a transaction that minted 184 BTC on the network in block 74638.

Satoshi Nakamoto (still involved in development at the time) and other core developers released an update that rolled back the network to block 74637 and patched the vulnerability. In other words, Bitcoin saw its own blockchain rollback in its early days.

Other points raised by PlanB include Ethereum switching to PoS, which he claims has consequences for the price. He suggested that changes to issuance and governance undermine Ethereum’s value proposition compared to Bitcoin’s fixed and predictable supply.

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Coin Market

Bitcoiners blast Arizona governor’s ‘ignorance’ after Bitcoin bill veto

Published

2 hours ago

May 4, 2025

Bitcoiners and United States government officials have criticized Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs’s decision to veto a bill that would have allowed the state to hold Bitcoin as part of its official reserves.

“This will age poorly,” Casa co-founder and cypherpunk Jameson Lopp said in a May 3 X post. Bitcoin (BTC) entrepreneur Anthony Pompliano said, “Imagine the ignorance of a politician to believe they can make investment decisions.”

Call for government officials who understand Bitcoin is “the future”

“If she can’t outperform Bitcoin, she must buy it,” Pompliano said. Crypto lawyer Andrew Gordon said, “We need more elected officials who understand that Bitcoin and crypto are the future.”

Source: Julian Fahrer

Wendy Rogers, who co-sponsored the bill with State Representative Jeff Weninger, also voiced her disappointment.

“Politicians don’t understand that Bitcoin doesn’t need Arizona. Arizona needs Bitcoin,” Rogers said.

On May 2, Hobbs vetoed the Arizona Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Act, which would have permitted Arizona to invest seized funds into Bitcoin and create a reserve managed by state officials. “Today, I vetoed Senate Bill 1025. The Arizona State Retirement System is one of the strongest in the nation because it makes sound and informed investments,” Hobbs said.

Source: Dr. Danish

Rogers said she would refile the bill during her next session. Rogers also pointed out that Arizona’s state retirement system already holds stocks of Michael Saylor’s Strategy (MSTR).

“Which is basically a leveraged Bitcoin ETF. Arizona’s Strategic Bitcoin Reserve bill will be back. HODL,” Rogers said. The stock price of Strategy rose 32% in April, the most significant monthly gain since November 2024.

However, well-known crypto skeptic Peter Schiff sided with Hobbs. “The government should not be making decisions to use public funds to speculate in cryptocurrencies,” Schiff said.

Arizona would have become the first US state to establish a Bitcoin Strategic Reserve if it had passed.

Arizona joins several other US states where similar efforts have failed. Similar proposals in Oklahoma, Montana, South Dakota and Wyoming have stalled or been withdrawn recently.

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Coin Market

OKX fires back at Tron's Justin Sun over mysterious 'freeze notice'

Published

5 hours ago

May 4, 2025

OKX founder and CEO Star Xu has publicly defended the crypto exchange after Tron founder Justin Sun accused it of failing to act on a law enforcement request to freeze stolen funds following a recent hack of Tron’s official X account.

“OKX also has consumers protection policy according to law, we can’t freeze a customer’s funds according to your personal X post or an oral communication. I think you should understand it as the CEO of HTX,” Xu said in an X post.

OKX says there is no communication in the spam box, either

Xu said that the crypto exchange had not received any related correspondence through OKX’s official channels. “Our LE cooperation team just checked the email, including the spam box; we haven’t received any request related with this case,” Xu said.

Source: Star Xu

In what is now an unavailable X post, but was screenshotted by Xu, Sun had earlier claimed that OKX has not responded to a “freeze notice” sent to its official email address from a “relevant law enforcement agency.” Sun said that he had no other way to contact OKX’s compliance department.

“These stolen funds do not belong to me; I’m acting to protect the community,” Sun said. On May 3, Tron DAO told its 1.7 million X followers that its account had been compromised. Tron explained that during the breach, an unauthorized party posted a malicious crypto token contract address, sent direct messages, and followed unfamiliar accounts.

“If you received a DM from our account on May 2, please delete it and consider it the work of the attacker.”

In response to Sun’s claims of inaction, Xu publicly called on him to provide a screenshot showing when and where the law enforcement request was made.

The Tron incident is one of several recent security breaches involving high-profile crypto accounts on X.

Kaito AI, an artificial intelligence-powered platform that aggregates crypto data to provide market analysis for users, and its founder, Yu Hu, were the victims of an X social media hack on March 15. The hackers opened up a short position on KAITO tokens before posting that the Kaito wallets were compromised and advised users that their funds were not safe.

Just a few weeks before, on Feb. 26, The Pump.fun X account was compromised to promote a fake governance token called “PUMP” and other fraudulent coins.

Meanwhile, the X account of UK member of Parliament and Leader of the House of Commons, Lucy Powell, was hacked on April 15 to promote a scam crypto token.

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Coin Market

Warren Buffett to step down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO by year's end

Published

11 hours ago

May 3, 2025

Warren Buffett, the CEO of publicly traded investment company Berkshire Hathaway, announced at the company’s annual shareholder meeting that he will step down by the end of 2025, and his chosen successor will take over as CEO, pending approval from Berkshire’s board of directors.

According to CNBC, Buffett reiterated that Greg Abel, the company’s vice chairman of non-insurance operations, who was previously named by Buffett as his successor, will take over. The Berkshire founder announced:

“The time has arrived when Greg should become the Chief executive officer of the company at year-end, and I want to spring that on the directors effectively and give that as my recommendation.”

Buffett added that he would stay at the company in an advisory role “but the final word would be what Greg decided,” the CEO said. Buffett’s decision to step down as CEO comes at a time when Berkshire Hathaway is sitting on cash reserves of roughly $348 billion.

Buffett speaking at the Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholder conference. Source: CNBC

The legendary stock investor has repeatedly called the growing US national debt unsustainable and issued warnings on the increasingly unstable macroeconomic environment that has taken a toll on the stock market.

Berkshire Hathaway outperforms S&P but is outclassed by Bitcoin

Despite being renowned for consistently returning roughly double the average performance of the S&P 500 to investors throughout his career, Buffet has failed to outperform Bitcoin (BTC) and gold.

Although Berkshire Hathaway’s class A common stock carries a price tag of over $809,000, and a market cap of over $1 trillion at the time of this writing, shares of the company have massively underperformed against Bitcoin in percentage terms since 2015.

Bitcoin has returned gains of over 781% to investors since 2020, while Berkshire Hathaway only returned approximately 150% over the same period.

Bitcoin’s price performance appears in magenta and has outperformed Berkshire Hathaway’s stock in percentage gains. Source: TradingView

Buffett has long been critical of BTC, arguing that the decentralized, supply-capped, digital currency has no value and likened it to a scam on several occasions.

The Berkshire founder and his business partner Charlie Munger have repeatedly said that Bitcoin does not even qualify as an investment and should be avoided by traders.

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