As of December 2017, there were an estimated 16.7 million bitcoins in circulation, with a total market value of $273 billion.
This means that, at current prices, there are more than 1,600 Bitcoin billionaires.
Bitcoin is often described as a digital gold, and for good reason. Like gold, it is scarce (there will only ever be 21 million bitcoins in existence), it is decentralized (it is not under the control of any government or financial institution), and it has a relatively low rate of inflation (the supply of new bitcoins is carefully controlled).
NOTE: Warning: Investing in Bitcoin is highly speculative and carries a high level of risk. It is not suitable for all investors and you should make sure you understand the risks involved before investing. Additionally, there is no reliable information regarding how many Bitcoin billionaires are currently in existence. As such, any claims about the number of Bitcoin billionaires should be taken with a grain of salt and independently verified before making any decisions.
However, unlike gold, Bitcoin is also extremely divisible (each bitcoin can be divided into 100 million smaller units) and very easy to transport (it can be sent anywhere in the world almost instantly and for very little cost).
So, how did these 1,600 people become Bitcoin billionaires? Well, some of them bought bitcoins when they were first released onto the market in 2009 (when they were worth just a few cents each), and have held onto them ever since. Others have made their fortune by mining bitcoins (using special computer hardware to solve complex mathematical problems that verify transactions on the Bitcoin network).
And still others have made their money by providing goods or services in exchange for bitcoins.
Whatever their story, these Bitcoin billionaires are now sitting on a huge pile of money – and there’s no telling how much it will be worth in the years to come.
4 Related Question Answers Found
It’s no secret that Bitcoin has been on a tear lately. The cryptocurrency has been breaking records left and right, with its value increasing by over 600% in the last year alone. This has led to a lot of people wondering if they should get in on the action and buy Bitcoin for themselves.
As of September 2019, the average person owns 0.0006 Bitcoin. This number was calculated by taking the total number of Bitcoin in circulation and dividing it by the total number of people in the world. The total number of Bitcoin in circulation is 18,527,100 and the total number of people in the world is 7,486,384,600.
Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency, a form of electronic cash. It is a decentralized digital currency without a central bank or single administrator that can be sent from user to user on the peer-to-peer bitcoin network without the need for intermediaries. Transactions are verified by network nodes through cryptography and recorded in a public distributed ledger called a blockchain.
The total number of Bitcoin nodes around the globe is constantly growing and as of July 2019, there were over 10,000 reachable nodes according to Bitnodes.io. Nodes are required to keep the Bitcoin network secure as well as decentralized. In order for a node to be considered active, it must have the most up-to-date copy of the blockchain and relay information about new blocks and transactions to other nodes.
