##### Bitcoin Holy Grail
Bitcoin
Decentralized cryptocurrency
Denominations
Plural
bitcoins
Symbol
₿ (Unicode: U+20BF ₿ BITCOIN SIGN (HTML ₿))[a]
Ticker symbol
BTC, XBT[b]
Precision
10−8
Subunits
1⁄1000
millibitcoin
1⁄100000000
satoshi[2]
Development
Original author(s)
Satoshi Nakamoto
White paper
“Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System”[4]
Implementation(s)
Bitcoin Core
Initial release
0.1.0 / 9 January 2009 (12 years ago) (2009-01-09)
Latest release
0.21.0 / 15 January 2021 (56 days ago) (2021-01-15)[3]
Development status
Active
Website
bitcoin.org
Ledger
Ledger start
3 January 2009 (12 years ago) (2009-01-03)
Timestamping scheme
Proof-of-work (partial hash inversion)
Hash function
SHA-256
Issuance schedule
Decentralized (block reward)Initially ₿50 per block, halved every 210,000 blocks[7]
Block reward
₿6.25[c]
Block time
10 minutes
Block explorer
www.blockchain.com/explorer
Circulating supply
₿18,355,100 (as of 1 May 2020[update])
Supply limit
₿21,000,000[5][d]
^ The symbol was encoded in Unicode version 10.0 at position U+20BF ₿ BITCOIN SIGN in the Currency Symbols block in June 2017.[1]
^ Compatible with ISO 4217.
^ May 2020 to approximately 2024, halved approximately every four years
^ The supply will approach, but never reach, ₿21 million. Issuance will permanently halt c. 2140 at ₿20,999,999.9769.[6]:ch. 8
This article contains special characters. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols.
Bitcoin[a] (₿) is a cryptocurrency invented in 2008 by an unknown person or group of people using the name Satoshi Nakamoto.[13] The currency began use in 2009[14] when its implementation was released as open-source software.[6]:ch. 1
Bitcoin 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.[7] Transactions are verified by network nodes through cryptography and recorded in a public distributed ledger called a blockchain. Bitcoins are created as a reward for a process known as mining. They can be exchanged for other currencies, products, and services.[15] Research produced by the University of Cambridge estimated that in 2017, there were 2.9 to 5.8 million unique users using a cryptocurrency wallet, most of them using bitcoin.[16]
Bitcoin has been criticized for its use in illegal transactions, the large amount of electricity used by miners, price volatility, and thefts from exchanges.[citation needed] Some economists, including several Nobel laureates, have characterized it as a speculative bubble at various times. Bitcoin has also been used as an investment, although several regulatory agencies have issued investor alerts about bitcoin.[17][18]
Contents
1 History
1.1 Creation 1.2 2011–2012 1.3 2013–2016 1.4 2017–2019 1.5 2020–present
2 Design
2.1 Units and divisibility 2.2 Blockchain
2.3 Transactions
2.3.1 Transaction fees
2.4 Ownership
2.5 Mining
2.5.1 Supply 2.5.2 Pooled mining
2.6 Wallets
2.6.1 Physical wallets
2.7 Implementations
2.7.1 Forks
2.8 Decentralization
2.8.1 Trend towards centralization
2.9 Privacy 2.10 Fungibility 2.11 Scalability
3 Ideology
3.1 Austrian economics roots 3.2 Anarchism and libertarianism
4 Economics
4.1 Acceptance by merchants 4.2 Financial institutions 4.3 As an investment 4.4 Venture capital 4.5 Price and volatility
5 Legal status, tax and regulation
5.1 Regulatory warnings 5.2 Price manipulation investigation
6 Criticism
6.1 As a speculative bubble 6.2 Energy consumption 6.3 Carbon footprint 6.4 Ponzi scheme and pyramid scheme concerns 6.5 Security issues 6.6 Use in illegal transactions 6.7 Other critical opinions
7 Implementation in software
7.1 Features 7.2 Development
8 In popular culture
8.1 Literature 8.2 Film 8.3 …
Collection: Encryption