Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency and a payment system, first proposed by an anonymous person or group of people under the name Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008.
Bitcoin is decentralized, meaning that it is not subject to government or financial institution control. Bitcoin is also pseudonymous, meaning that transactions are not attached to real-world identities.
Instead, Bitcoin addresses are used, which are public keys that can be used to receive Bitcoin.
As of 2017, there are approximately 16 million Bitcoins in circulation, with a total value of over $100 billion. By comparison, there are approximately $1.
2 trillion in circulation.
Bitcoin is often referred to as digital gold, due to its similarities to precious metals. Like gold, Bitcoin is scarce, with a limited supply of 21 million Bitcoins that will ever be mined.
Gold is also durable, portable, and divisible, making it an ideal store of value.
Similarly, Bitcoin is divisible into smaller units known as satoshis. One satoshi is equal to 0.
00000001 BTC. This makes Bitcoin highly liquid and easy to trade for goods and services.
Another similarity between Bitcoin and gold is that they are both mined. Gold is mined from the ground, while Bitcoin is mined through a process called Proof of Work (PoW).
In order for a new block to be added to the Bitcoin blockchain, miners must solve a complex mathematical problem. This requires significant computational power and energy.
As more miners join the network and compete to solve these problems, the difficulty level increases, making it harder to mine new Bitcoins. The reward for solving a block is currently 12.5 Bitcoins.
This number will halve every 210,000 blocks (approximately every 4 years). As the supply of new Bitcoins decreases and the demand increases, the price is likely to go up.
So far, 10$ worth of bitcoin equals __________ naira.