Next Monday, I’ll finally be interviewing Amaury Séchet for my Humans of eCash space, so as a sort of precursor to that, I wanted to take a few minutes to talk about something I see way too often in the eCash community, and that’s people who are frustrated with Amaury.
Simply put, it seems like some people think Amaury’s not doing enough. I’ve seen claims that he’s manipulating the price of XEC, that he doesn’t promote the project enough, or that he’s not even working on it at all, and I thought it would be helpful to step back and try to reset expectations a bit — not just defend Amaury, but to offer some perspective that I think gets lost in all the noise.
Let’s start with the idea that Amaury is manipulating the price of XEC.
Some people genuinely believe he’s suppressing the price of eCash, but let’s be real: how would that even make sense?
Sure, if he started acting crazy in public, or speaking negatively about the eCash project itself, it could definitely hurt the price. But has he ever done either of those things? No.
And the theory that he’s suppressing the price to accumulate more coins? That’s a stretch. First of all, I’m guessing he probably already has a huge XEC position. And second — trying to accumulate at all-time lows, hoping the price recovers later, is not exactly a sound strategy. It’s risky and kind of ridiculous. So let’s put that one to rest.
Next up: Amaury doesn’t promote eCash enough.
This one I hear a lot — that all he posts about is politics or random memes.
But let me ask you — does Elon Musk only tweet about Tesla and SpaceX?
Of course not. The man tweets about everything from politics to video games. And he’s the CEO of multiple companies.
Amaury’s no different. He’s a person with interests, opinions, and a sense of humor.
If he spent all day tweeting bullish takes about XEC, would that actually make you more confident in the project? Personally, I’d be more worried. It’d feel like he’s just trying to pump his bags because there’s nothing real behind the project itself.
Instead, he promotes eCash the way only he can — by doing interviews, laying out the technical vision, and explaining why it matters.
He doesn’t have to do that. But he still shows up. Now, could Amaury do an even better job of communicating his vision? Maybe. But the point is that he isn’t obligated to, and he doesn’t owe anyone anything.
Now for the third one: Is Amaury even working on eCash anymore?
I get where this comes from. You don’t see him submitting code updates these days.
But that doesn’t mean he’s checked out. He’s still involved — just more on the big-picture side. For example, the recent Heartbeat upgrade? That was his idea. The team executed it, but it came from him.
Also, let’s talk reality here — eCash isn’t exactly flush with cash. The only way Amaury could work full-time on eCash is if he did it for free. And expecting that long-term? That’s just not sustainable.
I think it’s also important to note that his involvement in eCash is very different from say Vitalik getting a big allocation of the Ethereum premine, or Elon owning upwards of 20% of the outstanding shares of Tesla. Amaury never got a pile of coins handed to him. He didn’t mine a trillion XEC when the network first started, and he’s said himself: he’s never even been paid out of the block reward.
He’s not obligated to work for free. Nobody is.
So here’s the bottom line:
Amaury was an engineer who saw a way to scale Bitcoin. He stepped up. He wrote code and invited others to help.
And instead of support, he got pushback. Instead of appreciation, he got served with lawsuits and community drama.
The fact is every investor community looks for a scapegoat when the price is down. I’ve seen it happen to Elon when Tesla dips. Same thing’s happening to Vitalik now with Ethereum underperforming. With eCash, that scapegoat seems to be Amaury.
When number goes up, nobody complains. When it doesn’t, people can’t seem to help but point fingers.
But let me remind you: Amaury never promised to be a cult leader. He’s never told anyone to buy XEC. He just explained why digital cash matters — and hoped others would join in building it.
So maybe we need to stop treating him like a savior and start seeing him for what he is: a brilliant engineer who offered a solution.
He doesn’t owe us anything. If Satoshi came back and sold all his Bitcoin, are you going to say no that isn’t allowed? On what basis? If anything, we owe Satoshi our gratitude, and the same goes for Amaury.
The way I see it, the question we should be asking ourselves isn’t, “Why isn’t Amaury working full time on eCash?”
The better question is: “How can we support him — and others like him — so they want to?”
If you’ve got thoughts, I’d love to hear them — drop a comment or message me. And stay tuned for next week’s interview with Amaury himself. Should be a great one.
Until then, take care.
(A big thank you to eCash community member @soumagrn336 for providing the image)
I am free and i decided to invest my money in this project because i can see many solution this tecnology combined the strong of other projects
Excellent article, Cain. I am looking forward to your interview with Amaury Séchet.
Most people are motivated by money, and we are too, in a way. However, not everyone is capable or willing to understand novelty. I believe that, given that eCash is still under development, it is even more difficult for them to comprehend the complexity of the task (particularly in light of the limited team resources, including manpower, money, and time).
It is a good thing that people like you and others exist to explain and popularize how things work. I remember watching a clip of Bill Gates on the David Letterman Show from 1995. He was explaining what could be done with the internet, and the host as well as the audience seemed to mock him by insinuating that the internet was useless. Well, I am almost certain that anyone who was there and is still there, uses the internet on a daily basis since then. My gut feeling is that it may very well follow the same pattern with eCash.
You mentioned the fact that we should feel gratitude towards Nakamoto and Séchet. You have my gratitude too.
As some would say: “hard times create strong men.” Keep up the good work!
nice once 🙂
Fine article, Cain.
The ‘better question’ near the end is a very important one. Is kind of like, “Ask not what eCash can do for you; ask what you can do for eCash.”
yep said this before, especially when you see people moaning 🙂
100% 👍
“The only way Amaury could work full-time on eCash is if he did it for free. And expecting that long-term? That’s just not sustainable”
Excuse me ! What is the dev funding for ? Regarding full time he isn’t even doing part time coding.
I get it he isn’t obligated but he can definitely do better.
The dev funding is 32% of the block reward. Do the math and you will see that at current prices, there is barely enough to pay for the current team.
good article, looking forward to the interview 🙂
hoping you hit us with a little good luck phrase in french (no pressure) 😉
It’s an outstanding article. The clear and calmly explained ideas make so many things easier to understand. Thank you deeply. I felt truly proud to see my name mentioned in such a remarkable article.
waiting for the next interview .Bon courage