BitMEX co-founder and popular cryptocurrency trader Arthur Hayes is currently funding the development of Bitcoin Core through a grant program at Maelstrom, a cryptocurrency investment firm in his home office.
The entrepreneur is widely known for his extremely optimistic essays and predictions on the rise of the Bitcoin price, which focus on the devaluation of the fiat currency as a catalyst for cryptocurrency adoption. However, unlike other projects, Maelstrom notes that Bitcoin has never held a formal fundraiser to finance its development.
“That’s why we are happy to return the favor and donate to the Bitcoin technology on which the cryptocurrency ecosystem depends,” Maelstrom wrote on his Bitcoin Grant Program page . Bitcoin Core is the first and most widely deployed Bitcoin software client. It defines the parameters of the Bitcoin protocol and acts as a standard for the entire industry and network.
Because Bitcoin lacked an initial raise, VC funding, a founding team and even a well-known creator, the protocol became the ultimate beacon of decentralization and stability in the crypto ecosystem. It also caused the protocol to implement new technology much more slowly and lacked the resources for basic software maintenance.
The Maelstrom grant program aims to spur Bitcoin’s technical development, with a particular focus on “resilience, scalability, resistance to censorship and privacy features.”
Individual developers can receive between $50,000 and $150,000 in grants sent in twelve monthly payments via BTC, USDC or USDT. Grants are allowed to accumulate up to $250,000 per year.
“The grantee is expected to contribute to the technical development of Bitcoin, potentially in the form of download requests or review work for the Bitcoin Core software project,” the company said. A pull request is a proposal to merge a set of changes with the Bitcoin code base.
Funding Bitcoin development
In recent years, other wealthy companies have begun providing grants to Bitcoin developers. In October, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey backed the nonprofit organization Bitcoin Brink with $5 million to fund developers. Meanwhile, Bitcoin ETF sponsors, including Bitwise and VanEck, have pledged to donate a portion of their profits to Bitcoin Core development.
And MicroStrategy’s executive chairman, Michael Saylor, has spoken out against providing too much funding for Bitcoin Core’s development without any targeted goal.
“I don’t want a developer industrial complex,” Saylor said in a May interview. “Perhaps providing unlimited, uncontrolled funding for development efforts that could destabilize the network is not the wayto go.”
