How Bitcoin Became Expensive

Written by Muray Peter

Bitcoin has become all the rage since last year and everyone wants to get their hands on some. However, most of us do not understand how it actually functions and how it can make us a profit. For beginners analysing price charts and understanding trading terms from the financial world can be a harrowing experience so we take a look at how Bitcoin became expensive over the years.

Discovered in 2009, Bitcoin was not traded on any exchange. The first recorded price was in 2010. Technically, Bitcoin was worth $0 in 2009, during its very first year of existence. The price of Bitcoins never touched the $1 mark in 2010 and the highest price for the year was just $0.39.

After two long years, Bitcoin touched the dollar on the Mt Gox exchange in February 2011. Bitcoin reached the top of its first ‘bubble’ at $31, followed by the first major price drop. It dropped to a serious low of $2 by December 2011, which eroded more than 95% of its value. A lot of opinions on improving the Bitcoin came up but they were never implemented.

Altcoins came into existence later when some people from the community started their own projects. Altcoins are cryptocurrencies other than Bitcoin. It is in this period that the value of Bitcoin started rising at a consistent level from $2 in December 2011 to an all-time high of $1,242 in November 2013 and it fell to $750 by November 2016. The rise and fall has been typical of Bitcoin’s volatility.

2017 was, however, the year when everything changed for Bitcoins in terms of price movement. It rose from $900 in January 2017 to $20,000 by December 2017 and attracted a plethora of followers. Alongside Bitcoin, the price of Ethereum rose by over 9000% in 2017. The market valuation of Ethereum recorded a 64-fold increase from $700 million to $45 billion, officially becoming the best performing cryptocurrency in the market year-to-date.

2018 has brought with it a barrage of questions about the longevity of cryptocurrencies and their usage. Governments across the countries will definitely try to regulate their use and the exchanges, which is sure to affect the price movements in either direction.

You can visit the original article here on btcwires.