[underwoodley]

> That sounds like in the world of stocks, a competitor could come along and decide to split the stocks of MY company from the outside

That's not really a good analogy. Suppose someone decided to offer one of their securities (or pay a dividend, or give some 'thing') to everyone who has one of your company's shares. All investors have to do is show a share certificate, and get a one-off gift proportional to how many they own.

If the new thing has value, your company's shares should all go up in value by roughly its value. Then shares which have already had the thing claimed, should go down by the same amount, leaving them roughly where they were before. If you decide not to claim the thing, you lose out by its value, but your original shares are still the same and you shouldn't have made a loss on them, just as a result of this split.

Of course, if the new thing is something which competes with your company, your company's shares might go down in response. But this isn't directly related to the value of a share in the new thing.

[tertius]

> If the new thing has value, your company's shares should all go up in value by roughly its value.

Should.

[underwoodley]

Yes, that's the word "should", which I used.

[tertius]

And why would this translate to something like cryptocurrency?

[underwoodley]

I honestly don't understand the point you're trying to make.

[tertius]

It's the same value argument that was made when bch was created. Didn't work out. Value didn't automatically transfer. Market attributed arbitrary value instantly.