Craig Wright is once again at the center of controversy… Not necessarily because he’s done anything wrong. That just seems to be what he does best.
Wright and Zhao: At Each Other’s Throats?
In a recent string of tweets, Changpeng Zhao – the CEO of Binance – expressed his frustration with Wright, and is denying any possibility that the Australian bitcoin developer could be Satoshi Nakamoto, the famed and notoriously private inventor of the world’s number one cryptocurrency by market cap.
One of his messages reads:
CSW is a fraud. Investing in a fraud never ends well. See below. Time will tell.
Zhao recently made headlines when he commented that bitcoin was in line for a major price spike in the coming weeks thanks to growing anticipation of May’s halving event. In the past, halvings have consistently led to further price spikes for bitcoin and cryptocurrencies like it, and Zhao believes there isn’t likely to be any break in this pattern.
He explained:
The bitcoin price will likely increase. I personally believe the halving has not been priced in.
Wright, on the other hand, has been the focal point of several legal issues over the past few months. Recently, Wright was sued by the estate of Dave Kleiman, a bitcoin developer who passed away in 2013. Dave’s brother Ira Kleiman filed suit against Wright, claiming he had tried to cheat him and his family out of billions in bitcoin earnings.
A Florida judge sided with the Kleiman clan and stated that Wright was to produce the private keys to his personal bitcoin stash and fork over half his earnings to Dave Kleiman’s family. While Wright initially seemed to agree to this verdict, he has since stated he has no idea if he’ll ever be able to get his fingers on the keys necessary to access the money… Money which may or may not exist.
If the bitcoin is there, this could certainly mean that Wright is Satoshi Nakamoto, which he initially claimed in 2016. However, despite these surprising claims, Wright has yet to produce any solid evidence supporting his words, and many have labeled him as one of the biggest charlatans in the digital space.
Other individuals who have been “accused” of being Satoshi Nakamoto include Japanese American physicist Dorian Nakamoto, who has repeatedly denied he has anything to do with the cryptocurrency’s creation. Nick Szabo – the man to introduce the world to smart contracts in 1994 – was also listed as a potential candidate, though he himself denies he had anything to do with writing bitcoin’s 2008 whitepaper.
Denials Mean Nothing
To be fair, though, these denials could simply be attempts at retaining privacy, and both figures remain prominent “Satoshi” possibilities.
The fight between Wright and Zhao initially began last year when Binance chose to delist bitcoin SV (BSV).
