Bitcoin Core Going Rogue?

Bitcoin core are going ROGUE, at least that's what some people are saying about the recent change proposed by Peter Todd...

In this weeks report we're going to cover exactly what is going on there.

But first, let's take a quick look at how the markets been holding up.

Macro Overview

MicroStrategy 2.0?

On 23 April 2025, Strike CEO Jack Mallers unveiled Twenty One Capital, a Bitcoin‑native holding company poised to go public via a SPAC merger with Cantor Equity Partners.

Backed by Tether and SoftBank, the firm will debut with a war chest of 42,000 BTC (~$3.9 B) and a laser‑focus on maximising Bitcoin Ownership Per Share—a deliberate echo of Michael Saylor’s playbook at MicroStrategy.

Should the deal close this quarter, Twenty One would enter the rankings as the third‑largest corporate BTC holder, leap‑frogging Tesla and Block.

Bitcoin Core

Since 2013 Bitcoin Core has enforced a default policy that restricts OP_RETURN outputs to a maximum of 83 bytes. The cap serves two purposes: (i) discouraging arbitrary data storage on‑chain and (ii) allowing nodes to safely prune OP_RETURN outputs because they are provably unspendable.

On 28 April 2025, veteran developer Peter Todd opened PR #32359 proposing to remove the hardcoded limit entirely. His argument: modern wallets and services already pass larger OP_RETURN payloads via custom relay policies (e.g., Ordinals inscriptions), so the limit is “a source of needless code complexity and inconsistent behaviour.” Todd insists that “policy should live in mempool, not consensus.”

Flash‑Point Issues

1. Blockchain Bloat: Opponents fear that unlimited OP_RETURN could rekindle the 2023 inscription frenzy, swelling the chain state, stressing archival nodes, and pushing fees higher for regular monetary transactions.
2. UTXO Set Growth: While OP_RETURN outputs don’t add to the spendable UTXO set, they do persist in the block files. Critics like Luke Dashjr warn this will increase IBD (initial block download) times, especially for resource‑constrained users.
3. Economic Centralisation: Higher fees may favour large custodial platforms at the expense of individuals, undermining Bitcoin’s decentralised ethos.
4. Precedent: Relaxing one long‑standing policy could embolden future attempts to loosen others—potentially eroding the narrow “digital‑gold” vision that the majority of Core maintainers support.

Debate Timeline