Qtum prepares for version 2.0 in its first hard fork upgrade

Qtum is preparing for its first hard fork since its inception back in September 2017.

On Oct. 17, 2019, at block 466,600, a system upgrade in the form of a hard fork will be activated on Qtum's Mainnet.

Thus far, four different consensus-related Qtum Improvement Proposals have been approved and will be included in the upcoming hard fork.

At the moment, addresses are required to have a small balance of QTUM in order to send and even receive any given amount of Qtum or QRC20 tokens.

The second upgrade will integrate precompiled contracts to the Qtum Ethereum Virtual Machine.

Since Qtum has never gone through a hard fork its version of the EVM is outdated.

The upgrade will only apply to Qtum Core wallets.

"The [upcoming] hard fork only applies to the Qtum Core wallets Qtum-Qt and qtumd, no other wallets. While updated wallets will make the hard fork automatically, users that don't update in time will see their Qtum Core wallets disconnected from the main network, will not be able to make transactions, and may see their coins staked on a split chain, where they are difficult to recover," explained Belove.

Despite the proximity of Qtum's systemwide upgrade market movement for QTUM has been lackluster.

Qtum is on the cusp of its first hard fork, which will be directed at improving the underlying technology behind its protocol.