Aaron Brown, Columnist

Bitcoin Split Is Nothing to Fear

Cryptocurrencies are no different from their physical counterparts: Both can withstand a so-called hard fork.

July 24, 2017 at 6:00 AM UTC

Aaron Brown is a former head of financial market research at AQR Capital Management. He is also an active crypto investor, and has venture capital investments and advisory ties with crypto firms. He is the author of the soon-to-be-released "Wrong Number."

1500660284_brown-bitcoin — Photographer: Roslan Rahman/AFP/Getty Images

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Over the last week, the price of Bitcoin crashed from around $2,400 to $1,800 on fears of a so-called hard fork, which is to say the digital currency would effectively split in two due to software upgrades at the end of the month that would create competing marketplaces.

Potential and actual forks have roiled cryptocurrency prices regularly since the introduction of Bitcoin in 2009. The problem with most reporting of these events is that it treats cryptocurrencies as different from physical currencies, and a fork as a complicated technological disaster.