Epstein files reveal Bitcoin’s secret war as Ripple insiders expose a decade of explosive hidden industry sabotage

A decade-old email is reviving questions about whether projects like Ripple posed a threat to Bitcoin’s development or merely served as competitors that some BTC backers sought to exclude. The email, dated July 31, 2014, appears to show Austin Hill, then described as Blockstream’s chief executive, telling the late Jeffrey Epstein and other recipients that “Ripple, and Jed McCaleb’s new Stellar [were] bad for the ecosystem.” Blockstream is a Bitcoin-focused blockchain technology firm. The correspondence resurfaced after the US Department of Justice published millions of pages of records under the Epstein Files Transparency Act, a disclosure that includes emails, files, images, and videos tied to past investigations. What was in the email? The email’s headline draw is obvious (as Jeffrey Epstein is a toxic magnet for attention), and Blockstream’s current leadership has moved quickly to deny any ongoing financial connection. However, the more durable story is about the sender’s premise rather than the recipients' notoriety. Austin Hill argued that capital flowing into Ripple and Stellar wasn’t merely competition. It was contamination. He viewed these projects as threats that could “damage” Bitcoin’s future by diluting investor alignment, developer focus, and narrative power. To many maximalists of that era, the “ecosystem” was not a broad crypto category. It was Bitcoin, plus the infrastructure, that made the flagship digital asset more usable without compromising its ethos. Thus, this worldview “justified” the specific pressure applied in the email. However, XRP community members view the email as evidence that early Bitcoin insiders sought to divert capital from Ripple. For context, XRP commentator Leonidas Hadjiloizou argued the email reads like an attempt to pressure investors to “pick a horse” and to reduce or withdraw a Blockstream allocation if they also backed Ripple or Stellar. According to him: “The email to Epstein and Joichi Ito by Austin Hill was just a...