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What Is Bitcoin? Everything You Need To Know About The Virtual Currency

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Bitcoin has been around for a while now but has only recently started gaining popularity. Created in the year 2009 by an unknown person who went by the name of ‘ Satoshi Nakamoto’, Bitcoin has stirred a quite a passionate debate online; something only a few technologies are able to do. To rid yourself of the confusion and chaos surrounding the cryptocurrency, allow us to explain a few things about the digital currency.

What is Bitcoin?

Bitcoin is a digital currency created in 2009. It’s not government owned, so that means that the government would not have any tracks of your financial endeavors if you use bitcoin. It also involves no middleman, which means no banks. You can use your bitcoins directly to buy products from Expedia, Dish etc. without having to go through any long process. However, the reason it got so famous is trading. Bitcoin trading has been around since it came into being but it’s price skyrocketed in 2017. Currently, 1 Bitcoin worth is over $15,000.

The creator

Bitcoin creator’s identity has never been confirmed. The creator goes by the (fake) name of Satoshi Nakamoto. In 2014, Temple City, California resident Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto was identified as the creator of Bitcoin. But he denied it. In 2015, Craig Wright, an Australian businessman came out as the Bitcoin creator but he could not prove it. Even now, the true creator’s identity has never been revealed. The creator is said to have mined over a million bitcoins in the early days, which means that they must have amassed a huge fortune over time.

The first transaction

The first transaction made by using a Bitcoin was a pizza. A man successfully traded 10,000 bitcoins for a Pizza. Now, the value of 10,000 bitcoins is over $99 million.

Ease of use

The Bitcoin is incredibly easy to use, you can use it to buy almost anything; whether it’s food or furniture. Bitcoin is an acceptable currency for different companies. Companies use it as a means of trading between each other. Big companies would not trade in it very often due to its low value, however, with its value increasing, companies have started trading in it on a much larger scale.

Setback

The Bitcoin has not always remained popular among investors. Throughout its lifespan, its value has gone up and down from time to time. Suddenly going high and then dropping down just as fast. A certain incident really pushed investors away from it. Mt. Gox, a Japanese exchange, got hacked in 2014. Over $460 million were stolen in Bitcoins (2014 value). This made investors especially concerned with the safety of Bitcoins and Bitcoin suffered a major decrease in value.

What billionaires say about it

Warren Buffet, one of the world’s most famous investors is not very fond of Bitcoins. He says that any smart investor should stay away from it.

Another billionaire investor Jamie Diman also strongly opposed it saying “You can’t have a business where people are going to invent a currency out of thin air. It won’t end well … someone is going to get killed and then the government is going to come down on it.”

What celebrities say about it

Recently, celebrities have started publicly displaying their interest in the Bitcoin. Gwenyth Paltrow, for example, encourages other actors to invest in the Bitcoin too. Ashton Kutcher, Floyd Mayweather, and countless other stars have also invested in Bitcoin startups.

Success stories

Howard and Cameron Winklevoss (the two twins who sued Mark Zuckerberg claiming that Facebook was their idea) invested $11 billion into the Bitcoin in 2013. The twins were declared the first ever Bitcoin billionaires when the Bitcoin’s value increased to $11,000 in December.

Erick Finman was just 14 when he invested $1000 into the Bitcoin. Now he is a successful millionaire.

Big sponsor

In August 2017, while the Bitcoin was steadily rising up, Fidelity Investments started to host Bitcoin by making clients able to view their Bitcoins. This came as a great benefit to the Bitcoin corporation as they finally had a great backer and a huge platform for their clients to access.

Hard fork

Bitcoin recently went through a hard fork, which basically means that there were issues due to the limited number of transactions. As a solution to this, Bitcoin cash was unveiled. “The Bitcoin fork speaks to a fundamental ideological rift over what’s more important: preserving the decentralized nature and independent control of the Bitcoin network, or accelerating transaction speeds to make the cryptocurrency more viable for mainstream e-commerce and payments.” Says Rob Marvin of PC Mag.

An astonishing achievement

At the start of December, Bitcoin value grew over $11,000 per unit. There are currently more than $16.7 million Bitcoin units in total. Its market capitalization rose to surpass even that of McDonald’s and Disney.

Public trading

On December 10, Bitcoin future became known. Basically, it’s a financial contract which obligates sellers to sell assets and buyers to buy them. Many say that that this will be great for the future of Bitcoin as it will make the random price fluctuations much more unlikely and help the value stay high for longer.