While the world was still grappling with the impact of the last economic crisis that hit the world, a little unknown wonder emerged in bitcoin, the first cryptocurrency that was to dominate the landscape in the next decade.
Starting from an underground network of libertarian-leaning cypherpunks, the top value cryptocurrency has grown to become a stronghold in the world financial system as it turns a decade on the 31st October 2018.
The ten years have been filled with a trajectory of considerable growth and development while there has also been the otherwise. However, it remains a force to reckon with indicating that the present success is only a shadow of greater success to come.
Bitcoin And Its Emerging Stage
The first mail of the founder of the premier crypto Satoshi Nakamoto on Oct. 31, 2008, at 06:10:00 PM noted the goal and purpose of the cryptocurrency briefly. This noted that ‘I’ve been working on a new electronic cash system that’s fully peer-to-peer, with no trusted third party.’ Subsequent messages on the cryptocurrency followed thus.
The emergence of bitcoin trail the blaze for over 2,000 other cryptocurrencies that emerged afterward. Some of them have failed and have become worthless as noted by Barry Silbert, the chief executive officer of the Digital Currency Group. Also, over 1,000 dead coins, those that failed before launching or have ceased operation.
Bitcoin has seen growth from a value lower than a cent to its all-time highest of almost $20,000 a year ago. Though, this year has been evident of the volatility associated with cryptocurrencies as it has seen a fall to the press value of $6,500.
After its emergence, fulfilling its purpose of creation has a currency became the talk, however within a year, there were testings as a currency with transaction recorded between Santoshi and Finney.
It is not until two years after that an official transaction was recorded on May 22, 2010. This was a transaction between Jacksonville programmer Laszlo Hanyecz, and Jeremy Sturdivant, placing 10,000 bitcoin in exchange for two pizzas. In today’s worth, each of the pizza was purchased for over $30 million.
Eight years after an event that has turned to be folklore as bitcoin pizza day in the history of cryptocurrency, over 200 exchanges worldwide presently list the cryptocurrency and has a dominant use by speculative investors, with over 250,000 on record on a daily basis at the moment. At the peak of bitcoin in 2017 over half a million transactions were recorded daily.
The past ten years, bitcoin and the cryptocurrencies globally have seen huge menace in the frequency of hack of wallets and exchanges. Prominent of such shocking event was the hack of the Japanese based exchange Mt. Gox, which led to the theft of about 800,000 bitcoins.
The event could have been detrimental to the status of the cryptocurrency as noted by Tim Draper, founder, and director of Draper Associates, considering the significant role of the exchange in bitcoin trading worldwide, however, the contrast was the case.
At the moment, bitcoin still has a low standard as a payment platform with capacity for five transactions per second in comparison to non-blockchain products such as MasterCard and VISA, and also other cryptocurrencies.
Bitcoin, Ten Years From Now
An accurate expression to use for what bitcoin would become in the next decade seems elusive, lending from the thought of Robert Kiyosaki, the billionaire widely famed for his bestselling book Rich dad poor dad.
Kiyosaki believes that cryptocurrency is the people’s money that will dominate the world’s financial system with the collapse of inflated US dollar. The time frame for this projection may seem unknown or might even be an impossible dream to crypto antagonists such as Nouriel Roubini, popularly known as Dr. Doom.
The projection of Nigel Green, founder, and CEO of deVere Group, a U.K. consulting firm, that “There’s an ongoing shift away from fiat money, and the momentum of this is only set to increase over the next ten years,” might be the reality for the next decade.
Also, the fulfillment of the thought of Draper should be looked forward to. He stated that “I see bitcoin becoming the most important and most transacted currency in the world, not just for remittances, or cross-border transactions, but for every use currency. It won’t be long before bitcoin eclipses the dollar as the most popular currency.”
