Recently the price of Bitcoin is increasing like never before. If you are someone who wants to know what Bitcoin is, how it works and how can one invest in it, then this article is for you. So, don’t be confused about Bitcoin and clear all your doubts by reading the below information.
What is Bitcoin?
Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency which can also be called as a type of digital currency. It was founded in the year 2009 by “Satoshi Nakamoto“ whose real identity is still a mystery. There are Bitcoin wallets available on Internet just like Paytm wallet and other wallets that we use online. Although no cryptocurrency has any physical presence still Bitcoins can be used to buy items online on websites that accept cryptocurrency as a payment method. Even big companies like Dell and Microsoft accept bitcoins. One can install the Bitcoin wallets on mobile or computer, the wallet will generate an address that can be used for receiving bitcoins from anyone on the Internet.
One interesting fact about Bitcoin is that no single entity or government controls bitcoins. One can buy or sell even sub-units of bitcoin, 1 Bitcoin is equal to 1,000,000 bits, bit is a subunit of Bitcoin.
Now, you must be wondering how the records of the bitcoin transactions are kept to check if there is any fraud or anything else. Bitcoin works on the blockchain technology which is a public ledger. Any bitcoin transactions done by users on the internet gets recorded into this public ledger. For the maintenance of this ledger, mining is done in which users provide the energy of their supercomputers which helps in doing calculations for this ledger. These users get bitcoins for providing computers. The only information anyone will see in the public ledger is user’s Bitcoin wallet address. This ensures anonymity of the user. One negative of bitcoin is that its transactions cant be refunded.
How to Get Bitcoins?
One can buy Bitcoin using the ‘real money’. Bitcoin price is about $10,000 right now. Another method of getting Bitcoin is let people pay you in form of Bitcoins for any service or product online. The third way of getting Bitcoins is giving your supercomputer for mining.
Why is the Bitcoin price rising so fast?
This can be answered by knowing the fact that there is a limited number of bitcoins available on the internet. Only 21 million bitcoins can be mined and this limit is expected to expire in 2040. For this reason, its demand is increasing day by day.
Altcoins is the term used for Alternative cryptocurrencies to Bitcoin, some of the most common cryptocurrencies after Bitcoin are Ethereum, Litecoin, Dogecoin.
Hope this information helps you in knowing the basics of what Bitcoin is and why it is achieving popularity among investors all around the world.
Also Read:How Winklevoss twins used Facebook payout to become world’s first Bitcoin billionaires
