WHY BITCOIN ACTUALLY HAS VALUE
Bitcoin was launched in 2009 as the world's first decentralized, private digital currency. Because it has no physical denominations, Bitcoin only exists inside of an interlinked computer network system. This is not entirely unique, as much of the U.S. dollar supply only exists in digital account balances instead of as actual green pieces of paper.
Bitcoins do not have value as a physical commodity like gold and are not widely accepted as legal tender like dollars. Rather, Bitcoin appears to have value for the following reasons:
It is popular. In short, people accept and trade in Bitcoin because other people accept and trade in Bitcoin. It is recognized and accepted as a currency by many.
“Why does it actually have value?” The two-word answer is one most economists are familiar with: network effect. The network effect is a lovely piece of jargon that refers to the quite commonsense statement that networked products and services tend to have more value when more people use them. The most common example is the telephone. During its early days when few people had access to telephones their utility, and therefore their value, were minimal. Today practically everyone has a phone, so its utility and value is so high as to be unquestionable. In this way the value of Bitcoin is directly tied to the number of its users and the frequency of their use.
Bitcoin creates value for the old investors and the new by splitting a finite currency supply more ways. That’s not trickery or theft, just good old-fashioned supply and demand at work—a basic and ancient economic principle applied to the world’s newest currency system.
Bitcoin is the first most popular digital crypto-currency whose price is influenced by a wide range of factors. Ideally, the bitcoin price is normally expressed as the exchange rate of the bitcoin in relation to other currencies. With an upsurge in the adoption and usage of this digital currency, the demand for bitcoins has significantly increased in the recent past. Note that because of the decentralized nature of this currency, the bitcoin price is not normally controlled by any company, organization or government. This means that before you try to predict the rise or fall in the price of bitcoins, it is important to understand what causes the same.
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