Bitcoin
Bitcoin is the first cryptocurrency — a digital asset transferred directly between users over a public network, with no bank or government issuing or clearing it.
Bitcoin launched in 2009, introduced in a white paper published under the name Satoshi Nakamoto. It solved a problem that had blocked earlier digital cash designs: how to stop the same unit being spent twice without a central authority checking every transaction.
Its supply schedule is fixed in the protocol. No more than 21 million bitcoin will ever exist, and the rate at which new coins are issued halves roughly every four years in an event known as the halving. This contrasts sharply with fiat currencies, whose supply central banks can expand.
Transactions are secured by proof of work. Miners compete to solve a computational puzzle; the winner adds the next block and receives newly issued bitcoin plus transaction fees. That expenditure of real-world energy is what makes rewriting history prohibitively expensive.
Bitcoin is highly volatile, and its regulatory treatment differs sharply between jurisdictions — as property, as a commodity, as a security, or as something restricted outright. Anyone holding it should understand both the price risk and the rules that apply where they live.
TrustFinance News tracks bitcoin alongside traditional assets in its live market data, and TrustFinance reviews the exchanges through which most people buy and hold it.