Jihan Wu. Source: Medium
Bitcoin Cash saw a notable price increase of around 10% today, and it is trading at around $287 at the time of this writing. The increase coincides with the news that Jihan Wu sent out a staff email announcing that Micree Ketuan Zhan, the co-founder and executive director of Bitmain, had been ousted.
Back in March of this year, following Bitmain’s failed IPO, Jihan Wu stepped down as co-CEO of the company, and his partner, Micree Ketuan Zhan, assumed control.
However, Wu appears to have since made a comeback, as he has reportedly sent an email announcing that Zhan had been ousted.
The email reads:
“Bitmain’s co-founder, chairman, legal representative, and executive director Jihan Wu has decided to dismiss all roles of Ketuan Zhan, effective immediately. Any Bitmain staff shall no longer take any direction from Zhan, or participate in any meeting organized by Zhan. Bitmain may, based on the situation, consider terminating employment contracts of those who violate this note.”
No further information had been provided at the time of this writing. It remains unclear how the company’s board reached the decision to oust Zhan.
This comes exactly a day after one of Bitmain’s major competitors, Canaan Inc., filed for an initial public offering (IPO) in the U.S. Its offering size is set at $400 million.
The price of Bitcoin Cash (BCH) seems to have been affected by the news, as it rose 10% immediately afterward. The cryptocurrency is now trading at around $287 and possesses a market cap of around $5.2 billion.
Back in August 2018, a report by BitMEX Research revealed that Bitmain had spent around 70% of its operating cash flow from 2017 to buy Bitcoin Cash. Back then, the company was under the management of Jihan Wu.
At the time, Bitmain filed for an IPO in Hong Kong, which later failed. The researchers noted:
“Once the company goes public, capital allocation decisions in this volatile and unpredictable market will be difficult enough; letting emotions impact too many investment decisions may not be tolerated.”
In January of this year, Jihan Wu was replaced as the CEO of the company by Haichao Wang, the engineering director at the time. This power play followed the obvious failure of the Bitcoin Cash move, which brought significant losses to the company.
Now that Wu is reportedly stepping back, it will be interesting to see where Bitmain goes from here.
