Exchange-traded products (ETP) issuer ETC Group announced plans on Wednesday to launch a new ETP that would support a forked version of Ethereum’s PoW chain post the network’s scheduled upgrade.
Following the upgrade, Ethereum is expected to go through a hard fork, splitting the network into two separate blockchains.
The main chain would be based on the upgraded proof-of-stake (PoS) consensus with cryptocurrency ETH, while the other chain, tentatively called ETHPoW, would stick to the proof-of-work (PoW) consensus with a new cryptocurrency ETHW.
With the new launch, ETC Group has extended its support to a group of miners who have been opposing the network’s transition to PoS from the PoW consensus mechanism.
The ETP will be called ETC Group Physical EthereumPoW (ETHWetc) and is set to be launched on XETRA German Electronic Exchange under the ticker ZETW on the 16th of September, days after the merge event.
“When we launched ETC Group, we committed to holders of our digital asset-backed securities that they would benefit from hard forks to the underlying digital assets and cryptocurrencies,” said the founder and co-CEO of ETC Group, Bradley Duke, in a statement. “We believe that it is only right that investors in our products should receive the proceeds of this fork.”
The London-based firm will also issue holders of Ethereum-based ETP (ZETH) the new token on a 1:1 basis, at no additional cost. ZETH will continue to function as it did before and switch to PoS in line with Ethereum’s main chain.
Last month, Chinese entrepreneur Chandler Guo and a group of miners started a protest to resist the transition to PoS by creating a fork that would support the PoW consensus since mining profitability might be affected due to the upgrade.
One of the leading crypto exchanges, Coinbase, recently said that it would allow the listing of ETHW or any other forked tokens after the merge. Binance also hasn’t ruled out listing the forked versions.
