Anthony Sassano, a prominent Ethereum advocate and educator, shared his views on Dec. 30, 2024, regarding why he believes Bitcoin is less decentralized
Prominent Ethereum advocate and educator Anthony Sassano shared his views on Dec. 30, 2024, regarding why he believes Bitcoin is less decentralized than Ethereum.
In a post on social media platform X, Sassano detailed several points comparing the two blockchain networks. Sassano began by stating that Bitcoin’s reliance on Bitcoin Core — the dominant implementation of the protocol — reflects a lack of client diversity, making Bitcoin Core effectively the protocol’s specification. He compared this to Ethereum, which has over ten independent clients supported through funding by the Protocol Guild, a collective initiative for Ethereum’s Layer 1 research and development.
Highlighting centralization in Bitcoin mining, Sassano noted that two KYC-compliant mining pools in the U.S. dominate Bitcoin’s hash rate. He went on to say that Bitcoin’s proof-of-work mining mechanism inherently centralizes due to economies of scale, rendering at-home mining economically unviable. In contrast, he claimed that Ethereum’s proof-of-stake system avoids similar issues, lacking the same economies of scale. He also highlighted that Ethereum allows users to stake at home profitably, particularly through services like Rocket Pool and Obol Collective, which reduce the minimum staking requirement.
Discussing long-term security, Sassano expressed concerns about Bitcoin’s sustainability as mining rewards diminish over the next two to three halvings. He suggested that this could lead to further mining centralization and vulnerabilities, opening up potential attacks. He contrasted this with Ethereum’s “tail issuance,” designed to maintain a sustainable security budget. Ethereum also has mechanisms to generate more fee revenue and offset issuance through fee burning.
Sassano claimed that Bitcoin’s core developer base is dwindling, with fewer than five active contributors, while Ethereum benefits from a larger pool of over 170 active core developers and researchers.
He also commented on the differing social dynamics of the two networks. Bitcoin’s community, he said, is unified under the “digital gold” narrative, which he argued limits diversity of thought. He believes that Ethereum’s social layer, which lacks a singular guiding narrative, allows for broader experimentation and innovation.
Sassano pointed to Ethereum’s response to the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctions on Tornado Cash as a test of its decentralization. He noted Ethereum’s efforts to enhance censorship resistance through research into mechanisms like inclusion lists, also known as FOCIL. Bitcoin, he stated, has faced sanctions on a smaller scale, targeting specific addresses, and he described China’s mining ban as the closest comparable test of Bitcoin’s decentralization.
Sassano clarified that his analysis was not intended as criticism but as a candid comparison of the two blockchain networks based on his observations.
