Bitcoin is the top cryptocurrency in the world. It is a peer-to-peer currency and transaction system based on a decentralized consensus-based public ledger called the blockchain that records all transactions.
Bitcoin was conceived in 2008 by Satoshi Nakamoto, but it was the product of many decades of cryptography and blockchain research, not just the work of one man. It has been the utopian dream of cryptographers and free trade advocates to have a decentralized, borderless currency based on blockchain. Their dream is now a reality with the growing popularity of bitcoin and other altcoins around the world.
Now, the cryptocurrency was first implemented via a consensus-based blockchain in 2009, and was first traded in the same year. In July 2010, the price of bitcoin was only 8 cents, and the number of miners and nodes was quite small compared to the tens of thousands currently.
Within a year, the new alternative currency rose to $1 and became an interesting prospect for the future. Mining was relatively easy and people made good money trading and in some cases even paying for it.
Within six months, the currency doubled again to $2. Although the price of bitcoin is not stable at a certain price level, it has been showing this crazy growth pattern for some time. At one point in July 2011, the coin went crazy and hit a record high of $31, but the market soon realized it was overvalued compared to the gains made in the field and corrected it back to $2.
In December 2012, there was a healthy rise to $13, but soon the price would explode. Within four months to April 2013, the price had risen to a whopping $266. It later corrected to $100, but this astronomical price increase for the first time raised it to the stars and people started discussing the real scenario with Bitcoin.
It was around this time that I was introduced to the new currency. I had my doubts, but as I read more about it, it became clearer that currency is the future because there is no one to manipulate it or impose itself on it. Everything had to be done with complete consensus and that’s what made him so strong and free.
So 2013 was a watershed year for the currency. Large companies have begun to publicly favor accepting bitcoin, and blockchain has become a popular subject for computer science programs. Many people thought at the time that bitcoin had served its purpose and would now settle down.
But the currency has become even more popular, with bitcoin ATMs being set up around the world and other competitors starting to flex their muscles in different corners of the market. Ethereum developed the first programmable blockchain, and Litecoin and Ripple started as cheaper and faster alternatives to bitcoin.
The magic figure of $1,000 was first broken in January 2017, and since then it has been increased four times by September. That’s a truly remarkable achievement for a coin that was worth just 8 cents just seven years ago.
Bitcoin even survived the hard fork on August 1, 2017 and has grown by almost 70% since then, while even the bitcoin cash fork managed to achieve some success. This is all due to the coin’s appeal and the stellar blockchain technology behind it.
While conventional economists claim that it is a bubble and that the entire crypto world would collapse, this is simply not the case. There is no such bubble because it is a noticeable fact that it actually ate up the stocks of fiat currencies and money transaction corporations.
The future is extremely bright for bitcoin and it is never too late to invest in it, both in the short and long term.