[wscott]

That https://fork.lol site is fascinating. Thanks for linking to it.

Right now BCH has a way higher hash rate than the difficulty, but that is going to adjust in 8hr or sooner if the trend continues. At that point, BTC will again be more profitable and you would expect everyone to switch back. Meanwhile, the fees on BTC are going way up because that chain gets used more frequently. That will also pressure miner back to the BTC chain.

[cesarb]

> and you would expect everyone to switch back

That happened when BCH was new. What happened then was that everyone switched to BTC, the BCH chain stopped completely for a few hours, and then BCH's extra difficulty adjustment rule kicked in and lowered the difficulty a lot, so everyone switched to BCH again. That oscillation was leading to periods of nearly zero blocks and periods of nearly a block per minute for the BCH chain. To prevent that, some BCH supporters left enough miners in the BCH chain that the extra difficulty adjustment rule didn't kick in, even when it was less profitable.

From what I've read, this time there's a difference: in a few days, BCH (or at least some of it) will have a hardfork which changes the extra difficulty adjustment rule. I haven't seen a good explanation of the new rule so far (only complaints that it was unilaterally decided by some developers), but depending on how it works this might be the last time miners can get thousands of blocks in a few days, which would explain why this time there's so much hash power in the BCH chain. And depending on how it works, there might be no longer a need for BCH supporters to keep enough miners in the BCH chain to prevent the extra difficulty adjustment rule from kicking in, so it's even possible that every miner switches to BTC at once.

On the other hand, if the new extra difficulty adjustment rule works, jumping from one chain to the other might become less profitable, so some miners might decide to stay on the BCH chain permanently. These miners might be now selling their BTC for BCH, which would neatly explain the rise in the BCH price and the drop in the BTC price.

[AJ007]

I wonder what the actual liquidity is of converting BCH in to hard currency? (which ultimately miners need to pay for operations and capital expenditures.)

It was blatantly obvious (to me) that something funny going on at MtGox meant the price was not real. The number of global exchanges, alt coins, and overall crytpocurrency appreciation in 2017 makes it almost impossible to sniff out potential problems. Despite the radical transparency of the blockchain ledger, all of the other trading and exchange activity is quite opaque.

[wscott]

And indeed the difficulty adjusted and the bulk of the miners returned to BTC. They have too much money invested to have an ideology. For the most part, miners will follow the money. Price discovery, you will have mining on each chain in proportion to its profits. Some might switch for other motivations, but a money motivated miner will balance him out.

I find the supposed "voting power" of the miners to be a mirage. When it comes down to it they just follow the money.