The pause underscores ideological divides shaping crypto merchant adoption in 2025.
At 04.46 UTC on October 12, 2025, Wu Blockchain (@wublockchain12) stated that Steak ‘n Shake had halted its in-house vote on accepting Ethereum (ETH) payments, after receiving criticism in the Bitcoin community. Vitalik Buterin, the co-founder of Ethereum, came out in support of the pause, saying it was a good move that values principle over popularity.
In its translation, Wu Blockchain quotes Buterin saying: Not every business needs to find as many customers as possible in the name of being neutral. And we must have individuals who do not betray their cause.
His statements demonstrate his overarching philosophy, which is the idea of decentralized networks that can only flourish when they are in harmony with communal belief, and not marketing value.
This position is also supported by historical information about the Ethereum Foundation and previous comments made by Buterin. He denounced token payment hype in 2023, pointing to the average gas fee of 3-5 USD and 15-30 TPS throughput of ETH, which also made it impractical to pay with it. His allowance of the restraint of Steak n Shake is a reflection of that pragmatism.
Wu Blockchain cites the vote pause to the Bitcoin maximalist feedback. The cryptocurrency community that had long promoted Bitcoin as “good money advised Steak n shake to keep BTC-only payments.
Since May 16, 2025, the BTC integration of Steak n Shake has processed more than 120,000 transactions with the Lightning Network and the sub-second settlement and sub-cent transaction fees of the latter are superior to the transfers on the ETH mainnet (CryptoCompare data).
There are social indicators that indicate the backlash has built up traction across X similar to the BTC payment U-turn by Tesla in 2021 following concerns over climate change.
By the year October 2025, ETH will be trading at $3,500 to $4,000, and BTC at $70,000 to $80,000 (CoinMarketCap). In comparison, the Lightning layer of BTC facilitates millions of micropayments every day with the support of an approximate number of 5,800 active nodes (Glassnode, Sept 2025).
Wu Blockchain, which has more than 100 k users, has cut Asia-based crypto news in the past. The outlet uses SolanaFloor-level accuracy measurements and direct statements in its previous reports, which gives it credibility to its coverage.
The adoption of BTC by Steak n shake is testified by the May 2025 press release by Bitpay and no corporate rejection of the ETH freeze has emerged as of 10.30 AM IST on the 12th of October.
