Creator of Litecoin Gets Rid of All of His Litecoins

Why has the founder and CEO of the fifth largest cryptocurrency by market cap sold all of his holdings?

Satoshi Nakamoto Satoshi Nakamoto “Satoshi Nakamoto” is the alias of the mysterious person (or group of people) that are responsible for the creation and launch of Bitcoin back in 2009 and the authorship of the Bitcoin whitepaper, published in 2008. As such, Satoshi Nakamoto is also the entity who conceptualized and created the first-ever blockchain network. Nakamoto was the first to effectively solve the double-spending problem for digital currency using a Peer-to-Peer (P2P) network. Nakamoto was active in the development of bi “Satoshi Nakamoto” is the alias of the mysterious person (or group of people) that are responsible for the creation and launch of Bitcoin back in 2009 and the authorship of the Bitcoin whitepaper, published in 2008. As such, Satoshi Nakamoto is also the entity who conceptualized and created the first-ever blockchain network. Nakamoto was the first to effectively solve the double-spending problem for digital currency using a Peer-to-Peer (P2P) network. Nakamoto was active in the development of bi Read this Term, your move. https://t.co/efKxK3coV4

— Charlie Lee [LTC] (@SatoshiLite) December 20, 2017

Litecoin went live in 2011, reached $1 billion in market capitalisation in 2013, and has over $18 billion as of now. It was a Litecoin transaction that was the first to be executed with the Lightning Network, and the two big Chicago exchanges are considering adding the coin as a new cryptocurrency future contract just a week after debuting the product with Bitcoin Bitcoin While some may still be wondering what is Bitcoin, who created Bitcoin, or how does Bitcoin work, one thing is certain: Bitcoin has changed the world.No one can remain indifferent to this revolutionary, decentralized, digital asset nor to its blockchain technology.In fact, we’ve gone a long way ever since a Florida resident Laszlo Hanyecz made BTC’s first official commercial transaction with a real company by trading 10,000 Bitcoins for 2 pizzas at his local Papa John’s.One could now argue that While some may still be wondering what is Bitcoin, who created Bitcoin, or how does Bitcoin work, one thing is certain: Bitcoin has changed the world.No one can remain indifferent to this revolutionary, decentralized, digital asset nor to its blockchain technology.In fact, we’ve gone a long way ever since a Florida resident Laszlo Hanyecz made BTC’s first official commercial transaction with a real company by trading 10,000 Bitcoins for 2 pizzas at his local Papa John’s.One could now argue that Read this Term. The future seems rosy for Litecoin, but founder Charlie Lee published an announcement this morning in which he said: "I no longer own a single LTC."

Discover credible partners and premium clients in China's leading event!

The reason for this is simple - he sold/donated everything in order to avoid a conflict of interest, as he explained in his announcement on Reddit.

He wrote: "...whenever I tweet about Litecoin price or even just good or bads news, I get accused of doing it for personal benefit. Some people even think I short LTC! So in a sense, it is conflict of interest for me to hold LTC and tweet about it because I have so much influence."

Lee has over 380,000 followers on Twitter, and social media has a significant influence on cryptocurrency prices. 'Shilling' is a real concern in this industry, as the value of digital assets is dependent on the opinion of the masses to a much greater extent than any other commodity.

And the masses are fickle. Pump and dump schemes are rife in the cryptocurrency world, so it is not surprising that Lee reports that he is often criticised for attempting to influence the price of Litecoin through his social media posts. "I have always refrained from buying/selling LTC before or after my major tweets, but this is something only I know," he writes.

One might expect his announcement to cause a drop in price, much as a commander deciding to leave the field mid-battle might cause his troops to lose confidence. However, the price of Litecoin actually went up after he sold his holdings, and does not seem to have been materially affected.

Lee assures the public that he will still be working full-time on Litecoin, and that his personal wealth is such that he no longer needs to rely on the monetary success of the coin itself.

Still, the public are hard to please. We reported today on the suspiciously punctual spike in the price of Bitcoin Cash just as it debuted on the US' biggest cryptocurrency exchange. Coincidentally(?), Lee's announcement came out just before that. He updated his announcement: "I wrote the above before the recent Bcash on GDAX/Coinbase fiasco. As you can see, some people even think I’m pumping Bcash for my personal benefit. It seems like I just can’t win."