Recently, Black Rock educational publication video explaining Bitcoin, which I thought was fantastic – it's amazing to see Bitcoin being discussed on such a big platform. But, of course, Bitcoin X (Twitter) was a melting over one particular line in the video: “There is no guarantee that the 21 million Bitcoin supply cap will not be changed.”
HealthRnager from Natural News claimed“Bitcoin has become far too centralized, and now the wrong people pretty much control their algorithms. They tell you in advance what they plan to do.”
Now, let me be clear: this is complete nonsense. The controversy is overblown, and the idea that BlackRock would – or even could – change the supply of bitcoin. The statement in their video is technically true, but it's just a legal disclaimer. That does not mean that BlackRock plans to increase the supply of bitcoin. And even if they were, they don't have the power to pull it off.
The 21 million Bitcoin cap is default – it's not up for debate. The entire Bitcoin ecosystem—miners, developers, and nodes—operates on this key principle. Without it, Bitcoin wouldn't be Bitcoin. And although BlackRock is a financial giant and holds more than 500,000 Bitcoins for its ETF, its influence on Bitcoin is almost non-existent.
Bitcoin is a proof of work (PoW), not a proof-of-money (PoS) system. It doesn't matter how much bitcoin BlackRock has; Economic nodes have the real power.
Let's play devil's advocate for a second. Say BlackRock is trying to propose a protocol change to increase the supply of bitcoin. What will happen? The large network of nodes would simply reject it. The history of Bitcoin proves this. Remember Roger Ver and the Bitcoin Cash fork? He had significant influence and holdings, but his version of bitcoin became irrelevant because most economic actors did not follow him.
If Bitcoin could be controlled by a single organization like BlackRock, it would have failed long ago. The US government, with its unlimited money printer, could easily get 10% of the supply if that's all it took to control Bitcoin. But that's not how Bitcoin works. Its decentralized nature ensures that no single group – no matter how powerful – can dictate its terms.
So, stop worrying about BlackRock “changing” Bitcoin. Their influence has hard limits. Even though they tried to push developers to change the protocol, nodes refused it. Bitcoin's decentralization is its greatest strength, and no one — not BlackRock, no Michael Saylor– that can change.
This article is a Take. The views expressed are entirely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.
