Steemit Crypto Academy Season 4 Beginners Course - Task 5: Bitcoin, Cryptocurrency, Public Chains.

Hello fellow steemians, it's been another wonderful week for me and a great pleasure to attend the lecture 5 of the fixed beginner's course organized by Professor @stream4u. All thanks goes to the Almighty Allah and also a big thanks goes to Professor @stream4u who took his time and make sure to digest this lecture to our understanding. This lecture was really helpful as I learned a lot from it. Below is the questions I have decided to answer from the questions given.

What Is Cryptocurrency And How Will You Like To See Cryptocurrency In The Future.

Below is my homework submission post.

What Is Cryptocurrency.

Taking a critical look at the word Cryptocurrency, we can deduce two words from it which are Crypto and Currency. Crypto I will say is the only word which seems to be new to the world but with currency, it has been in existence since some decades back. We understand currency is used in making exchanges with other items. Currency is also used as a tool for payment of goods. Each and every country in the world have it's own currency which they accept for payment of goods and services and we all know this currency to be in a paper money form.

In the olden days, exchanges were made by our great grandfathers by a method we called Barter whereby they used goods to exchange goods rather than currency to exchange goods. But right now, things have changed because technology is increasing and growing each and everyday and here we are using currency for exchange today.

As I made mentioned, technology is developing everyday and there is a new method we can use to exchange for goods and services and this exchange is known as cryptocurrency. Now, I will like to explain to you to understand what cryptocurrency is with some of its positive impacts it has on the world.

Cryptocurrency is a digital currency which is build on a decentralized blockchain and it is used for the payment of goods and services. The currency we are using in our various countries are centralized meaning that they are govern and control by a central authority. But with cryptocurrencies, they are decentralized and there is no central authority governing or controlling it. Unlike fiat money or the paper money we are using which is in the physical form, cryptocurrencies is not in the physical form meaning that we can not touch it or feel it.

These cryptocurrencies is established on a system that is disseminated and circulated in multiple computers around the world. As I already said, cryptocurrencies are decentralized and this decentralized nature enables them not to be in the custody of the central authorities or governments. The network on which the cryptocurrencies are built on cannot be hacked and control which makes it to be one of the transparent means of exchange. The most crucial and important component of almost all the cryptocurrencies is the blockchain and this blockchain is a managerial strategy which helps in securing the quality and integrity of transactional data.

In recent times, cryptocurrencies have encountered a lot of criticisms and objectives because of some reasons and some of the reasons are; some users use it to do illicit or criminal activities, others complain about how volatile it is whilst some think that the blockchain technology is not reliable and cannot be trusted.

I would like to state some features or characteristics of cryptocurrencies. So I have elaborated below some of the features of cryptocurrencies on the blockchain.

Cryptocurrencies are not governed or controlled by anyone not even the governments or centralized authority. If it is not centralized, then it simple means that cryptocurrencies are decentralized.

Our personal informations and data are safe and secure when trading with cryptocurrencies. The security governing the blockchain technology is very high which makes it impossible to be hacked.

Charges involved in trading huge amount of money is lowered or reduced in cryptocurrencies unlike with fiat or our traditional banks which have very high charges when carrying out transactions.

Anyone can access the blockchain technology without any difficulty or barrier. This means that anyone can acquire cryptocurrencies and trade with them.

Users sensitive informations and data are secured and protected when it comes to Crypto. One's identity is hidden from the beginning to the end of a transaction from the other party.

When we talk about cryptocurrency, we cannot do away with blockchain or decentralized system and registering on this systems is very easy unlike our traditional banks which require you to bring a lot of documents.

There are currently over thousands cryptocurrencies created and in circulation in the crypto market. Cryptocurrencies are ranked with respect to their individual market capitalization on one of the most popular coin platform namely the Coinmarketcap. The Coinmarketcap gives traders and investors information about the recent ranking of all the available cryptocurrencies in the market according to their capitalization as well as the 24hr volume on which this cryptocurrencies are traded on.

The coinmarketcap names and lists all the cryptocurrencies in existence so we can go there and discover new coins created into the crypto space. This platform also provides the latest or most recent price of all the cryptocurrencies available as well as it's all time high and low within the last 24hrs. Another feature we can find is that, you can discover the exchanges you can trade this cryptocurrencies on as well as their pairs in the various markets.

The screenshot below is taken from the coinmarketcap platform showing the top ranked cryptocurrencies with highest market capitalization in the world.

Advantages associated with cryptocurrencies

The cost involve or fee charge during transaction is very low and insignificant,.

Trading cryptocurrency assets is very fast, secured and reliable. You can make a huge transaction within the possible short time period.

Cryptocurrency allows or gives anyone who is interested in trading and investing in them to gain a lot of profit when the asset prices increases.

Users are rest assured of privacy when it comes to crypto currency assets trading. A user can make a full transaction without the other party knowing the person he is transacting with.

In cryptocurrency, users are in full control over the assets in their wallets and they can decide to do whatever they want with it without anyone questioning them.

Learning about what cryptocurrency is and how to trade and invest in them are easy to grab and understand. This behaviour of cryptocurrencies makes them to be more user friendly as compared to traditional banking or our fiat money.

Disadvantages associated with cryptocurrencies

Inexperience traders or new beginners who have low knowledge about cryptocurrencies can get liquidated If they make huge losses through trading or investing in the coins. The reason for the losses is because of how volatile cryptocurrencies are in essence.

Because of how secured the system is, some people have started using this cryptocurrencies to involve in illicit and criminal activities. They can conceal their identity and carryout this criminal activities without anyone realizing or suspecting.

The cryptocurrency and blockchain network requires very high security in order to prevent hackers from hacking this system. Traders works with third party exchanges and this some of this exchanges have been hacked before, meaning that a higher security network is needed to protect users and investors funds.

How I Would Like To See Cryptocurrency In The Future

Since the creation of Bitcoin, thousands of cryptocurrencies are created each and everyday. The successfulness of Bitcoin in the financial world motivates other developers to create new cryptocurrencies. Decades back, the world used to depend on the traditional banking system which generated a lot of problems between the governments and the investors. This lost of trust in the banking system and the financial crisis at that time motivated Satoshi Nakamoto to create the world first and most successful cryptocurrency.

And with the way cryptocurrencies are accepted by the financial world and populace, I see cryptocurrencies overtaking the traditional system of transactions in some few years to come. Right now the world most reserved currency is gold, which I think that Bitcoin would overtake it in some decades to come.
If we can observe critically, fiat money or paper money printed by the central banks are losing their value because of their excess supply. We all know that when there is excess supply of a commodity in the market, it value tends to decrease or depreciates. The same is happening to our fiat money printed by the central banks.

Because of that, a lot of people are now channelling their efforts in to investing in cryptocurrencies. A lot of people have started adopting cryptocurrencies because of the importance involve in investing in them. Although fist money generates interest with time but not as compared to the profit gain from investing in cryptocurrencies.

We can see that some countries have started accepting cryptocurrencies as an exchange for their goods and also for performing transactions. One of the cryptocurrency accepted by most of this countries is Bitcoin. This development is indeed an amazing one for the cryptocurrency world and community. El Salvador is one of the countries that accepted to use Bitcoin for their transactions and it is now legally accepted in this country. I have the firm believe that with time, all the countries in the world will accept cryptocurrencies for carrying out huge transactions legally. I am in Ghana and we are currently trading with cryptocurrencies but it is not yet backed legally. I believe and hope that with time, my country will adopt cryptocurrencies to be used for payment of goods and services.

We can also see that some reputable organizations and institutions have started buying Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as a means of investment. This is because they know and understand the benefits involved in investing in this coins. They also have the believe that cryptocurrencies might overtake fiat money in some years to come. Not only companies, a lot of influential and rich men are channeling their investments into cryptocurrencies. We all saw how one of the most richest and influential man in the world who is in the person of Elon Musk, was promoting and calling investors to invest in one of the Meme tokens, that is Dogecoin. This man also bought Bitcoin worth $1.5 billion and added it to his Tesla company.

Not only Elon Musk but other influential and rich men are also buying into investing in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies they believe will do wonders in the future. This people have a lot of followers who are ready to also invest in what they believe in. So the constant promotion of cryptocurrencies by this people has lead to most of their followers also investing in these coins.

With this kind of support from these people, there is no doubt that cryptocurrencies has a very bright future and anyone who believes in them will not be disappointed in the future. Although we know that the central banks would try their possible best to stop cryptocurrencies from being successful but with believe and determination they can never stop it from reaching the moon.

Conclusion

The creation of cryptocurrencies and the successfulness of Bitcoin has bring a lot of positive impact in the financial world. Cryptocurrency is taking over the traditional banking system because a lot of people have lost trust in them. Most people are not feeling safe with the traditional system of transaction because their money is being controlled by the central banks. But with cryptocurrencies, users are in full control of their money and nobody dictates to them how they are supposed to spend it.

Cryptocurrency is taking over the world and we believe that within some few years to come, it would be accepted by everyone around the world.

Thank you.

Cc: @nane15