Chain Split Tokens were announced by Bitfinex on March 18, 2017. Here is a copy of the announcement that Simon Dixon, CEO BnkToTheFuture discusses with Phil Potter, Bitfinex. They discuss how to protect your Bitcoins from any upcoming hard fork and a general update from Bitfinex since the 2016 Bitcoin heist.
Today, Bitfinex proudly introduces trading on Chain Split Tokens (CST). The first such product of its kind, CSTs will allow Bitfinex customers to speculate on future fork events of the Bitcoin blockchain, specifically, the potential fork between Bitcoin Core and Bitcoin Unlimited. We are designating these CSTs as BCC (Bitcoin Core) and BCU (Bitcoin Unlimited).
CSTs will trade as BTC and USD pairs, initially without margin, and as will any other product with list, we will reevaluate that decision if there is sufficient liquidity.
Users will be able to create CSTs by “splitting” a bitcoin through the Token Manager (located in the Order Type drop down menu of the sidebar order ticket). Once split, the BTC will be removed from your account for each BCC and BCU added. Through the same Token Manager, you will be able to reverse this process at anytime, trading in equal numbers of BCC and BCU to extract BTC.
If no fork occurs by December 31, 2017, then BCU will expire worthless and BTC will be given in exchange for each BCC holder. If, however, there is a fork, specifically Bitcoin Unlimited, then, as soon as we list Bitcoin Unlimited, we will exchange BCU tokens for Bitcoin Unlimited tokens as well as retiring BCC tokens in favor of Bitcoin Core tokens. More detailed information can be found in the Chains Split Token Terms and Conditions.
We are planning a few additional enhancements including a realtime display of total CSTs as well as segregated cold storage for the bitcoins that have been split, which we will periodically settle to and from our hot wallet.