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{{Short description|Decentralized digital currency}}
{{Technical|date=September 2011}}
{{for|the colloquial expression for coinage|Bit (money)}}

{{Redirect-distinguish-text|₿|"฿" for ]}}
{{Infobox software
{{pp-extended|small=yes}}
| name = Bitcoin
{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2024}}
| title = Bitcoin
{{Use American English|date=December 2017}}
| logo = ]
{{infobox cryptocurrency
| screenshot = ]
| caption = Bitcoin-Qt | currency_name = Bitcoin
| image_1 = Bitcoin.svg
| collapsible =
| image_2 =
| author =
| image_width_1 = 150
| developer = ] (inactive, possibly a pseudonym),<ref name="processors" /> Gavin Andresen, Pieter Wuille, Nils Schneider, ], Wladimir J. van der Laan, Gregory Maxwell, and others<ref>{{cite web |title=Bitcoin Client Webpage |url=http://www.bitcoin.org/}}</ref>
| image_width_2 = 110
| maintainer = Gavin Andresen
| image_title_1 = Official logo from bitcoin.org
| released = {{Start date|2009|01|09}}<ref></ref>
| alt1 = Prevailing bitcoin logo
| discontinued =
| precision = 10<sup>−8</sup>
| latest release version = 0.6.3
| subunit_ratio_1 = {{frac|1000}}
| latest release date = {{Start date and age|2012|06|25}}
| subunit_name_1 = Millibitcoin
| latest preview version =
| subunit_ratio_2 = {{frac|{{val|1000000}}}}
| latest preview date =
| subunit_name_2 = Microbitcoin
| frequently updated = <!-- DO NOT include this parameter unless you know what it does -->
| subunit_ratio_3 = {{frac|{{val|100000000}}}}
| programming language = ]
| subunit_name_3 = {{lang|ja-Latn|Satoshi|italic=no}}{{efn|name=satoshi}}<ref name="satoshi unit">{{Cite journal |last=Bradbury |first=Danny |date=November 2013 |title=The problem with Bitcoin |url=https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S1361372313701015 |journal=Computer Fraud & Security |language=en |volume=2013 |issue=11 |pages=5–8 |doi=10.1016/S1361-3723(13)70101-5 |access-date=25 November 2023 |archive-date=18 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230118052355/https://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S1361372313701015 |url-status=live |issn=1361-3723}}</ref>
| operating system = ], ], ], ]
| plural = Bitcoins
| platform =
| symbol = '''₿'''<br/>(Unicode: {{unichar|20BF|BITCOIN SIGN|html=}})<ref name="unicode-10">{{cite web |date=20 June 2017 |title=Unicode 10.0.0 |url=https://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode10.0.0/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170620130342/http://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode10.0.0/ |archive-date=20 June 2017 |access-date=20 June 2017 |publisher=Unicode Consortium}}</ref>
| language = Dutch, English, French, Italian, German, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish.
| code = BTC
| status = Beta
| genre = ] | implementations = ]
| initial_release_version = 0.1.0
| license = ] (])
| initial_release_date = {{Start date and age|df=yes|2009|1|9|p=y}}
| website = {{URL|http://www.bitcoin.org/}}
| code_repository = {{URL|https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin}}
| status = Active
| latest_release_version = 28.0
| latest_release_date = {{Start date and age|df=yes|2024|10|04|p=y}}<ref>{{cite web |title=Bitcoin Core 28.0 released |date=2 October 2024 |url=https://bitcoincore.org/en/2024/10/02/release-28.0/ |access-date=5 October 2024 |archive-date=5 October 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20241005063435/https://bitcoincore.org/en/2024/10/02/release-28.0/ |url-status=live}}</ref>
| forked_from =
| website = {{URL|https://bitcoin.org}}
| programming_languages = C++
| operating_system =
| author = ]
| developer =
| white_paper =
| source_model = ]
| license = ]
| ledger_start = {{Start date and age|df=yes|2009|1|3|p=y}}
| hash_function = ] (two rounds)
| circulating_supply = ₿19,591,231 ({{as of|2024|01|06|lc=y}})
| supply_limit = ₿21,000,000{{efn|name=supply}}
| timestamping = ] (partial hash inversion)
| issuance_schedule = Decentralized (block reward)<br />Initially ₿50 per block, halved every 210,000 blocks
| block_time = 10 minutes
| block_reward = ₿3.125 ({{as of|2024|lc=y}})
| exchange_rate = Floating
| market_cap = <!--A reliable source is required -->
| using_countries = ]<ref name="BTCSVSept7FT">{{cite news |title=El Salvador's dangerous gamble on bitcoin |url=https://www.ft.com/content/c257a925-c864-4495-9149-d8956d786310 |date=7 September 2021 |access-date=7 September 2021 |work=] |department=The editorial board |archive-date=7 September 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210907081627/https://www.ft.com/content/c257a925-c864-4495-9149-d8956d786310 |url-status=live }}</ref>
}} }}
{{Special characters}}
<!-- include terms: decentralized, ], partial hash inversion, central authority, trusted third party, financial institution, timestamp server-->
'''Bitcoin''' (abbreviation: '''BTC'''; ]: '''₿''') is the first ] ]. Based on a ] ideology, bitcoin was invented in 2008 by ], an unknown person.<ref name="whoissn">{{Cite news |last=S. |first=L. |date=2 November 2015 |title=Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? |newspaper=The Economist |url=https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2015/11/02/who-is-satoshi-nakamoto |access-date=21 November 2023 |archive-date=22 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201122172929/https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2015/11/02/who-is-satoshi-nakamoto |url-status=live }}</ref> Use of bitcoin as a ] began in 2009,<ref name="NY2011">{{Cite magazine |last=Davis |first=Joshua |date=10 October 2011 |title=The Crypto-Currency: Bitcoin and its mysterious inventor |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/10/10/the-crypto-currency |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141101014157/http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/10/10/the-crypto-currency |archive-date=1 November 2014 |access-date=31 October 2014 |magazine=]}}</ref> with the release of its ].<ref name="Antonopoulos2014">{{Cite book |last=Antonopoulos |first=Andreas M. |title=Mastering Bitcoin: Unlocking Digital Crypto-Currencies |year=2014 |publisher=O'Reilly Media |isbn=978-1-4493-7404-4 |author-link=Andreas Antonopoulos}}</ref>{{rp|ch. 1}} In 2021, ].<ref name="BTCSVSept7FT" /> It is mostly seen as an ] and has been described by some scholars as an ].<ref name="4Nobels">{{Cite news |last=Wolff-Mann |first=Ethan |date=27 April 2018 |title='Only good for drug dealers': More Nobel prize winners snub bitcoin |work=Yahoo Finance |url=https://finance.yahoo.com/news/good-drug-dealers-nobel-prize-winners-snub-bitcoin-184903784.html |url-status=live |access-date=7 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180612141128/https://finance.yahoo.com/news/good-drug-dealers-nobel-prize-winners-snub-bitcoin-184903784.html |archive-date=12 June 2018}}</ref> As bitcoin is ]ous, ] has attracted the attention of regulators, leading to ] {{as of|2021|lc=yes}}.<ref name="SunYin2019">{{Cite journal |last1=Sun Yin |first1=Hao Hua |last2=Langenheldt |first2=Klaus |last3=Harlev |first3=Mikkel |last4=Mukkamala |first4=Raghava Rao |last5=Vatrapu |first5=Ravi |date=2 January 2019 |title=Regulating Cryptocurrencies: A Supervised Machine Learning Approach to De-Anonymizing the Bitcoin Blockchain |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332118587 |journal=] |language=en |volume=36 |issue=1 |page=65 |doi=10.1080/07421222.2018.1550550 |s2cid=132398387 |issn=0742-1222 |access-date=29 November 2023 |archive-date=21 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240421113631/https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332118587_Regulating_Cryptocurrencies_A_Supervised_Machine_Learning_Approach_to_De-Anonymizing_the_Bitcoin_Blockchain |url-status=live }}</ref>


] in the ] ] verify transactions through ] and record them in a public ], called a ], without central oversight. ] between nodes is achieved using a computationally intensive process based on ], called ], that secures the bitcoin blockchain. Mining consumes large quantities of electricity and has been criticized for ].<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Huang |first1=Jon |last2=O’Neill |first2=Claire |last3=Tabuchi |first3=Hiroko |author3-link=Hiroko Tabuchi |date=3 September 2021 |title=Bitcoin Uses More Electricity Than Many Countries. How Is That Possible? |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/09/03/climate/bitcoin-carbon-footprint-electricity.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230217105559/https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/09/03/climate/bitcoin-carbon-footprint-electricity.html |archive-date=17 February 2023 |access-date=26 October 2022 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}</ref>
'''Bitcoin''' is a decentralized ] system that uses ], ]s and ] so as to enable users to conduct irreversible transactions without relying on trust. Nodes ] ] to the network, which records them in a public history, called the ''blockchain'', after validating them with a ]. Users make transactions with ''bitcoins'', an ], digital currency that the network issues according to predetermined rules. Bitcoins do not have the backing of and do not represent any government-issued currency.<ref name="whitepaper"/>


{{TOC LIMIT|4}}
The Bitcoin network came into existence on 3 January 2009 with the issuance of the first bitcoins.<ref>{{cite web |title=Block 0 – Bitcoin Block Explorer |url=http://blockexplorer.com/block/000000000019d6689c085ae165831e934ff763ae46a2a6c172b3f1b60a8ce26f }}</ref> In the same month the creator, ] (thought to be a pseudonym), released the original ''Bitcoin client'' as ].<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.mail-archive.com/cryptography@metzdowd.com/msg10142.html |title=Bitcoin v0.1 released}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://sourceforge.net/news/?group_id=244765 |title=SourceForge.net: Bitcoin}}</ref> Prior to the invention of Bitcoin, electronic commerce systems could not securely operate without relying on a central authority to prevent ]. Nakamoto sidestepped this requirement for Bitcoin by employing a proof-of-work approach in a peer-to-peer network to reach consensus between peers on the validity of transactions.<ref name="whitepaper">{{cite web
|last= Nakamoto
|first= Satoshi
|title= Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System
|url= http://www.bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/04/01/uk-factbox-bitcoin-idUKBRE8300JP20120401 |title=Factbox – What is Bitcoin – currency or con? |quote=...&nbsp;A problem facing creators of non-physical currencies is how to ensure users do not spend their money twice. Before Bitcoin was invented... }}</ref> Bitcoin is a relatively new project under active development. As such, its developers caution that users should treat it as experimental software.<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://bitcoin.org |title=bitcoin.org |quote=Bitcoin is an experimental new digital currency that enables instant payments to anyone, anywhere in the world
}}</ref><ref name=GavinThinkStronger>{{cite web|last=Andresen|first=Gavin|title=That which does not kill us makes us stronger|url=http://gavinthink.blogspot.com/2011/06/that-which-does-not-kill-us-makes-us.html|work=GavinThink|accessdate=15 April 2012|date=20 June 2011|quote=I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Bitcoin is an experiment. Treat it like you would a promising Internet start-up company: maybe it will change the world, but realize that investing your money or time in new ideas is always risky.}}</ref>


==Network== ==History==
{{Main|History of bitcoin}}
Owners transfer bitcoins by sending them to another Bitcoin address using a website or program designed for this purpose. Under the hood, the software transfers the coins by generating a digital signature to link the prior transaction with the public key of the next owner. Bitcoin nodes record all data necessary to make any valid transaction in a publicly ] called the ''block chain''. Nodes build the block chain using a ] that prevents ] and confirms transactions.<ref name="processors">{{cite news|last=Davis|first=Joshua|title=The Crypto-Currency|url=http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/10/10/111010fa_fact_davis|accessdate = 11 October 2011|newspaper=]|date=10 October 2011}}</ref>


===Bitcoin addresses=== ===Background===
Before bitcoin, several ] were released, starting with ]'s ] in the 1980s.<ref name=Narayanan2017/> The idea that solutions to computational puzzles could have some value was first proposed by cryptographers ] and ] in 1992.<ref>{{Citation |last=Dwork |first=Cynthia |title=Pricing via Processing or Combatting Junk Mail |date=1993 |work=Advances in Cryptology — CRYPTO’ 92 |volume=740 |pages=139–147 |editor-last=Brickell |editor-first=Ernest F. |url=http://link.springer.com/10.1007/3-540-48071-4_10 |access-date=2025-01-02 |place=Berlin, Heidelberg |publisher=Springer Berlin Heidelberg |language=en |doi=10.1007/3-540-48071-4_10 |isbn=978-3-540-57340-1 |last2=Naor |first2=Moni}}</ref><ref name=Narayanan2017/> The concept was ] by ] who developed ], a ] scheme for ] in 1997.<ref name="Narayanan2017" /> The first proposals for distributed digital scarcity-based ] came from ]s ] (b-money) and ] (]) in 1998.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Tschorsch |first1=Florian |last2=Scheuermann |first2=Bjorn |date=2 March 2016 |title=Bitcoin and Beyond: A Technical Survey on Decentralized Digital Currencies |url=https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7423672 |journal=IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials |volume=18 |issue=3 |pages=2084–2123 |doi=10.1109/COMST.2016.2535718 |s2cid=5115101 |issn=1553-877X |access-date=23 November 2023 |archive-date=19 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231119025114/http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7423672 |url-status=live }}</ref> In 2004, ] developed the first currency based on reusable proof of work.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Judmayer |first1=Aljosha |chapter=History of Cryptographic Currencies |date=2017 |chapter-url=https://link.springer.com/10.1007/978-3-031-02352-1_3 |title=Blocks and Chains |pages=15–18 |publisher=] |language=en |doi=10.1007/978-3-031-02352-1_3 |isbn=978-3-031-01224-2 |last2=Stifter |first2=Nicholas |last3=Krombholz |first3=Katharina |last4=Weippl |first4=Edgar |series=Synthesis Lectures on Information Security, Privacy, and Trust |url=https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-02352-1 |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=22 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231122135006/https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-02352-1 |url-status=live }}</ref> These various attempts were not successful:<ref name="Narayanan2017" /> Chaum's concept required centralized control and no banks wanted to sign on, Hashcash had no protection against ], while b-money and bit gold were not resistant to ]s.<ref name=Narayanan2017>{{Cite journal |last1=Narayanan |first1=Arvind |last2=Clark |first2=Jeremy |date=27 November 2017 |title=Bitcoin's academic pedigree |url=https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3136559 |journal=] |volume=60 |issue=12 |pages=36–45 |doi=10.1145/3132259 |s2cid=6425116 |issn=0001-0782 |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=14 October 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231014120907/https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3136559 |url-status=live }}</ref>
Bitcoin uses ] using ].<!--<ref>https://en.bitcoin.it/ECDSA, Dec 2011</ref>--> Every user in the Bitcoin network has a ] containing a number of cryptographic ]s. The wallet's public keys are transformed into Bitcoin ''addresses'', which act as the ''receiving'' endpoints for all payments. Addresses in human-readable form appear as strings of numbers and letters around 33 characters in length, always beginning with the digit 1 or 3, as in the example of<!-- Do not change this intentionally invalid address. Address chosen by consensus (see ]), it is SHA1("Bitcoin") in base58 with an invalid checksum character added --> ''175tWpb8K1S7NmH4Zx6rewF9WQrcZv245W''.<!--<ref>{{cite web |url=https://en.bitcoin.it/Address |title=Bitcoin documentation on addresses}}</ref>--> The wallet's private keys are used to authorize transactions from that user's wallet.


===2008–2009: Creation===
Users obtain new Bitcoin addresses from any Bitcoin client software, including web-based Bitcoin wallets. Creating a new address is a completely offline process and requires no communication with the Bitcoin peer-to-peer network.
{{external media
| float = right
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| image1 =
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{{multiple image
| width = 90
| image1 = Bitcoin old.png
| image2 = Bitcoin.png
| footer = Bitcoin logos made by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009 (left) and 2010 (right).
}}
The domain name ''bitcoin.org'' was registered on 18 August 2008.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Bernard |first=Zoë |date=2 December 2017 |title=Everything you need to know about Bitcoin, its mysterious origins, and the many alleged identities of its creator |work=Business Insider |url=http://www.businessinsider.com/bitcoin-history-cryptocurrency-satoshi-nakamoto-2017-12 |url-status=live |access-date=15 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180615010015/http://www.businessinsider.com/bitcoin-history-cryptocurrency-satoshi-nakamoto-2017-12 |archive-date=15 June 2018}}</ref> On 31 October 2008, a link to a ] authored by ] titled ''Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System'' was posted to a cryptography mailing list.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Finley |first=Klint |date=31 October 2018 |title=After 10 Years, Bitcoin Has Changed Everything—And Nothing |magazine=Wired |url=https://www.wired.com/story/after-10-years-bitcoin-changed-everything-nothing/ |url-status=live |access-date=9 November 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181105070656/https://www.wired.com/story/after-10-years-bitcoin-changed-everything-nothing/ |archive-date=5 November 2018}}</ref> Nakamoto implemented the bitcoin software as ] and released it in January 2009.<ref name="NY2011" /> Nakamoto's identity remains unknown.{{r|whoissn}} According to computer scientist ], all individual components of bitcoin originated in earlier academic literature.<ref name=Narayanan2017/> Nakamoto's innovation was their complex interplay resulting in the first decentralized, Sybil resistant, ] tolerant digital cash system, that would eventually be referred to as the first blockchain.<ref name=Narayanan2017/><ref name="te20151031">{{Cite news |last=Economist Staff |date=31 October 2015 |title=Blockchains: The great chain of being sure about things |url=https://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21677228-technology-behind-bitcoin-lets-people-who-do-not-know-or-trust-each-other-build-dependable |url-status=live |newspaper=] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160703000844/http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21677228-technology-behind-bitcoin-lets-people-who-do-not-know-or-trust-each-other-build-dependable |archive-date=3 July 2016 |access-date=18 June 2016 }}</ref> Nakamoto's paper was not ]ed and was initially ignored by academics, who argued that it could not work.<ref name=Narayanan2017/>


On 3 January 2009, the bitcoin network was created when Nakamoto mined the starting block of the chain, known as the '']''.<ref name="Wired:RFB">{{Cite magazine |last=Wallace, Benjamin |date=23 November 2011 |title=The Rise and Fall of Bitcoin |url=https://www.wired.com/2011/11/mf-bitcoin/ |url-status=live |magazine=Wired |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131031043919/http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/11/mf_bitcoin |archive-date=31 October 2013 |access-date=13 October 2012}}</ref> Embedded in this block was the text "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of ]", which is the date and headline of an issue of '']'' newspaper.<ref name="NY2011" /> Nine days later, Hal Finney received the first bitcoin transaction: ten bitcoins from Nakamoto.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Popper |first=Nathaniel |date=30 August 2014 |title=Hal Finney, Cryptographer and Bitcoin Pioneer, Dies at 58 |work=] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/31/business/hal-finney-cryptographer-and-bitcoin-pioneer-dies-at-58.html |url-status=live |access-date=2 September 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140903162835/http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/31/business/hal-finney-cryptographer-and-bitcoin-pioneer-dies-at-58.html |archive-date=3 September 2014}}</ref> Wei Dai and Nick Szabo were also early supporters.<ref name="Wired:RFB" /> On May 22, 2010, the first known ] using bitcoin occurred when programmer Laszlo Hanyecz bought two ] pizzas for ₿10,000, in what would later be celebrated as "Bitcoin Pizza Day".<ref>{{cite news |last1=Cooper |first1=Anderson |title=Meet the man who spent millions worth of bitcoin on pizza |url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/meet-the-man-who-spent-millions-worth-of-bitcoin-on-pizza-60-minutes-2019-05-16 |work=] |date=16 May 2019 |access-date=8 December 2021 |archive-date=8 December 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211208180706/https://www.cbsnews.com/news/meet-the-man-who-spent-millions-worth-of-bitcoin-on-pizza-60-minutes-2019-05-16/ |url-status=live }}</ref>
Most Bitcoin addresses look like meaningless random characters. It is possible to get more personalized addresses using programs that generate addresses rapidly, keeping ones matching some specific pattern. Examples such as 1LoveUNuf2az5e2m7v9kGRAFHYjDaf4jju with the 1LoveU prefix can be obtained in a few minutes on an average desktop computer.<ref> – Binaries for Vanitygen version 0.17</ref><ref> – Source code for Vanitygen</ref>


===Transactions with Bitcoin=== ===2010–2012: Early growth===
] estimate that Nakamoto had mined about one million bitcoins<ref>{{Cite news |last=McMillan |first=Robert |title=Who Owns the World's Biggest Bitcoin Wallet? The FBI |magazine=Wired |url=https://www.wired.com/2013/12/fbi-wallet/ |url-status=live |access-date=7 October 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161021221609/https://www.wired.com/2013/12/fbi-wallet/ |archive-date=21 October 2016}}</ref> before disappearing in 2010 when he handed the network alert key and control of the ] over to ]. Andresen later became lead developer at the ],<ref>{{cite news |last=Simonite |first=Tom |title=Meet Gavin Andresen, the most powerful person in the world of Bitcoin |date=15 August 2014 |url=https://www.technologyreview.com/2014/08/15/12784/the-man-who-really-built-bitcoin |work=] |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=22 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231122163924/https://www.technologyreview.com/2014/08/15/12784/the-man-who-really-built-bitcoin |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Odell |first=Matt |date=21 September 2015 |title=A Solution To Bitcoin's Governance Problem |work=TechCrunch |url=https://techcrunch.com/2015/09/21/a-solution-to-bitcoins-governance-problem/ |url-status=live |access-date=24 January 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160126051521/http://techcrunch.com/2015/09/21/a-solution-to-bitcoins-governance-problem/ |archive-date=26 January 2016}}</ref> an ] founded in September 2012 to promote bitcoin.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Bustillos |first=Maria |date=1 April 2013 |title=The Bitcoin Boom |magazine=The New Yorker |url=https://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/the-bitcoin-boom |url-status=live |access-date=30 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180702064450/https://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/the-bitcoin-boom |archive-date=2 July 2018}}</ref>
A Bitcoin software client uses a wallet, a collection of the user's addresses and corresponding private encryption keys. Users can create as many Bitcoin addresses as they wish. When user ''A'' wants to transfer bitcoins to user ''B'', ''A'' creates a transaction message indicating that some of the balance associated with their Bitcoin wallet is to be sent to the address of ''B'', and ''A'''s Bitcoin client signs the transaction with the address's private keys.<!--<ref>{{cite web |url=https://en.bitcoin.it/Transactions |title=Transactions – Bitcoin |publisher=En.bitcoin.it |date=2011-06-16 |accessdate = 2011-06-22}}</ref>-->


After early "]" transactions, the first major users of bitcoin were ]s, such as the ] ]. During its 30 months of existence, beginning in February 2011, Silk Road exclusively accepted bitcoins as payment, transacting ₿9.9&nbsp;million, worth about $214&nbsp;million.<ref name=JEP/>{{rp|222}}
Because of the asymmetric cryptographic method, only the owner's private keys are able to create a valid signature to send coins from their Bitcoin wallet. The private keys cannot be determined from the signature – they are a secret known only to the address owner.<ref group="Notes">Assuming the infeasibility of ] the keys, and no ] exists.</ref> The owner's node broadcasts the resulting message to send money, the ''transaction'', on the peer-to-peer network. Other members of the peer-to-peer network validate the cryptographic signatures and the amounts of the transaction before accepting the money transfer.<ref name="ars-06-08-11"/>


===2013–2014: First regulatory actions===
===Confirmations===
In March 2013, the US ] (FinCEN) established regulatory guidelines for "decentralized virtual currencies" such as bitcoin, classifying American bitcoin miners who sell their generated bitcoins as ]es, subject to registration and other legal obligations.<ref>{{cite news |last=Lee |first=Timothy B. |date=19 March 2013 |title=US regulator Bitcoin Exchanges Must Comply With Money Laundering Laws |url=https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/03/us-regulator-bitcoin-exchanges-must-comply-with-money-laundering-laws/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131021203745/http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/03/us-regulator-bitcoin-exchanges-must-comply-with-money-laundering-laws/ |archive-date=21 October 2013 |access-date=28 July 2017 |work=]}}</ref> In May 2013, US authorities seized the unregistered ] ].<ref>{{cite news |last=Dillet |first=Romain |title=Feds Seize Assets From Mt. Gox's Dwolla Account, Accuse It Of Violating Money Transfer Regulations |url=https://techcrunch.com/2013/05/16/mt-gox-dwolla-account-money-seizure/ |work=] |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131009161856/http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/16/mt-gox-dwolla-account-money-seizure/ |archive-date=9 October 2013 |access-date=15 May 2013}}</ref> In June 2013, the US ] seized ₿11.02 from a man attempting to use them to buy illegal substances. This marked the first time a government agency had seized bitcoins.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Sampson |first=Tim |year=2013 |title=U.S. government makes its first-ever Bitcoin seizure |work=The Daily Dot |url=http://www.dailydot.com/business/11-bitcoins-seized-government-dea/ |url-status=live |access-date=15 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130712010826/http://www.dailydot.com/business/11-bitcoins-seized-government-dea/ |archive-date=12 July 2013}}</ref> The FBI seized about ₿30,000 in October 2013 from Silk Road, following the arrest of its founder ].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Hill |first=Kashmir |title=The FBI's Plan For The Millions Worth Of Bitcoins Seized From Silk Road |work=Forbes |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2013/10/04/fbi-silk-road-bitcoin-seizure/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140502154935/http://www.forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2013/10/04/fbi-silk-road-bitcoin-seizure/ |archive-date=2 May 2014}}</ref>
]
To prevent ], the network implements what Nakamoto describes as a ''peer-to-peer distributed timestamp server'', which assigns sequential identifiers to each transaction, which are then hardened against modification using the idea of chained ] (shown in the Bitcoin client as ''confirmations''). In his white paper, Nakamoto wrote: "we propose a solution to the double-spending problem using a peer-to-peer distributed timestamp server to generate computational proof of the chronological order of transactions."<ref name="whitepaper" />


In December 2013, the ] prohibited Chinese financial institutions from using bitcoin.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Kelion, Leo |date=18 December 2013 |title=Bitcoin sinks after China restricts yuan exchanges |work=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25428866 |url-status=live |access-date=20 December 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131219214615/http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25428866 |archive-date=19 December 2013}}</ref> After the announcement, the value of bitcoin dropped,<ref>{{Cite news |date=6 December 2013 |title=China bans banks from bitcoin transactions |work=] |publisher=Reuters |url=https://www.smh.com.au/business/markets/currencies/china-bans-banks-from-bitcoin-transactions-20131206-2yugy.html |url-status=live |access-date=31 October 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140323102824/http://www.smh.com.au/business/markets/currencies/china-bans-banks-from-bitcoin-transactions-20131206-2yugy.html |archive-date=23 March 2014}}</ref> and ] no longer accepted bitcoins for certain services.<ref>{{Cite news |date=7 December 2013 |title=Baidu Stops Accepting Bitcoins After China Ban |work=Bloomberg |location=New York |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-12-07/baidu-stops-accepting-bitcoins-after-china-ban.html |url-status=live |access-date=11 December 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131210214547/http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-12-07/baidu-stops-accepting-bitcoins-after-china-ban.html |archive-date=10 December 2013}}</ref> Buying real-world goods with any virtual currency had been illegal in China since at least 2009.<ref>{{cite web |date=29 June 2009 |title=China bars use of virtual money for trading in real goods |url=http://english.mofcom.gov.cn/aarticle/newsrelease/commonnews/200906/20090606364208.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131129184312/http://english.mofcom.gov.cn/aarticle/newsrelease/commonnews/200906/20090606364208.html |archive-date=29 November 2013 |access-date=10 January 2014 |publisher=English.mofcom.gov.cn}}</ref>
Whenever a node broadcasts a transaction, the network immediately labels it as ''unconfirmed''. The confirmation status reflects the likelihood that an attempt to reverse the transaction could succeed. Any transaction broadcast to other nodes does not become ''confirmed'' until the network acknowledges it in a collectively maintained timestamped-list of all known transactions, the ''block chain''.


===Target=== ===2015–2019===
Research produced by the ] estimated that in 2017, there were 2.9 to 5.8 million unique users using a ], most of them using bitcoin.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Hileman |first1=Garrick |last2=Rauchs |first2=Michel |title=Global Cryptocurrency Benchmarking Study |url=https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/fileadmin/user_upload/research/centres/alternative-finance/downloads/2017-global-cryptocurrency-benchmarking-study.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170410130007/https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/fileadmin/user_upload/research/centres/alternative-finance/downloads/2017-global-cryptocurrency-benchmarking-study.pdf |archive-date=10 April 2017 |access-date=14 April 2017 |publisher=Cambridge University}}</ref> In August 2017, the ] software upgrade was activated. Segwit was intended to support the ] as well as improve ].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Vigna |first=Paul |date=21 July 2017 |title=Bitcoin Rallies Sharply After Vote Resolves Bitter Scaling Debate |work=The Wall Street Journal |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/bitcoin-rallies-sharply-after-vote-resolves-bitter-scaling-debate-1500656084 |access-date=21 November 2023 |archive-date=21 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231121164350/https://www.wsj.com/articles/bitcoin-rallies-sharply-after-vote-resolves-bitter-scaling-debate-1500656084 |url-status=live }}</ref> SegWit opponents, who supported larger blocks as a scalability solution, ] to create ], one of many ].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Selena Larson |date=1 August 2017 |title=Bitcoin split in two, here's what that means |work=CNN Tech |publisher=Cable News Network |url=https://money.cnn.com/2017/08/01/technology/business/bitcoin-cash-new-currency/index.html |url-status=live |access-date=2 April 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180227214042/https://money.cnn.com/2017/08/01/technology/business/bitcoin-cash-new-currency/index.html |archive-date=27 February 2018}}</ref>
Every ''generating'' node in the Bitcoin network collects all the unacknowledged transactions it knows of in a file called a ''block'',<!--<ref>{{cite web |url=https://en.bitcoin.it/Block_hashing_algorithm |title=Bitcoin documentation on the block hashing algorithm }}</ref>--> which also contains a reference to the previous valid block known to that node. It then appends a ] value to this previous block and computes the ] ] of the block and the appended nonce value. The node repeats this process until it adds a nonce that allows for the generation of a hash with a value lower than a specified ''target''. Because computers cannot practically reverse the hash function, finding such a nonce is hard and requires on average a predictable amount of ]. This is where the ''proof-of-work'' concept comes in to play. When a node finds such a solution, it announces it to the rest of the network. Peers receiving the new solved block validate it by computing the hash and checking that it really starts with the given number of zero bits (i.e., that the hash is within the target). Then they accept it and add it to the chain.


In December 2017, the first ] on bitcoin was introduced by the ] (CME).<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/17/worlds-largest-futures-exchange-set-to-launch-bitcoin-futures-sunday-night.html |title=Bitcoin debuts on the world's largest futures exchange, and prices fall slightly |date=17 December 2017 |access-date=19 January 2024 |website=CNBC |last=Cheng |first=Evelyn |archive-date=18 January 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240118182719/https://www.cnbc.com/2017/12/17/worlds-largest-futures-exchange-set-to-launch-bitcoin-futures-sunday-night.html |url-status=live }}</ref>
===Block chain===
The network confirms a transaction when it records it in a block. Further blocks generated further confirm it. After six confirmations, most Bitcoin clients considers a transaction confirmed beyond reasonable doubt. After this, it is overwhelmingly likely that the transactions are part of the main block chain rather than an ''orphaned'' one, and impractical to reverse.


In February 2018, the price crashed after China imposed a complete ban on bitcoin trading.<ref>{{Cite news |last=French |first=Sally |date=9 February 2017 |title=Here's proof that this bitcoin crash is far from the worst the cryptocurrency has seen |publisher=Market Watch |url=https://www.marketwatch.com/story/heres-proof-that-this-bitcoin-crash-is-far-from-the-worst-the-cryptocurrency-has-seen-2018-02-09 |url-status=live |access-date=3 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180703220246/https://www.marketwatch.com/story/heres-proof-that-this-bitcoin-crash-is-far-from-the-worst-the-cryptocurrency-has-seen-2018-02-09 |archive-date=3 July 2018}}</ref> The percentage of bitcoin trading in the Chinese ] fell from over 90% in September 2017 to less than 1% in June 2018.<ref>{{Cite news |date=7 July 2018 |title=RMB Bitcoin trading falls below 1 pct of world total |publisher=Xinhuanet |agency=] |url=http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-07/07/c_137308879.htm |url-status=live |access-date=10 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180710225218/http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-07/07/c_137308879.htm |archive-date=10 July 2018}}</ref> During the same year, bitcoin prices were negatively affected by several hacks or thefts from cryptocurrency exchanges.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Chavez-Dreyfuss |first=Gertrude |date=3 July 2018 |title=Cryptocurrency exchange theft surges in first half of 2018: report |work=Reuters |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-crypto-currencies-ciphertrace/cryptocurrency-exchange-theft-surges-in-first-half-of-2018-report-idUSKBN1JT1Q5 |url-status=live |access-date=10 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180704120854/https://www.reuters.com/article/us-crypto-currencies-ciphertrace/cryptocurrency-exchange-theft-surges-in-first-half-of-2018-report-idUSKBN1JT1Q5 |archive-date=4 July 2018}}</ref>
Eventually, the block chain contains the cryptographic ownership history of all coins from their creator-address to their current owner-address. Therefore, if a user attempts to reuse coins he already spent, the network rejects the transaction.


===2020–present===
The network must store the whole transaction history inside the block chain, which grows constantly as new records are added and never removed. Nakamoto conceived that as the database became larger, users would desire applications for Bitcoin that didn't store the entire database on their computer. To enable this, the system uses a ] to organize the transaction records in such a way that a future Bitcoin client can locally delete portions of its own database it knows it will never need, such as earlier transaction records of bitcoins that have changed ownership multiple times, while keeping the cryptographic integrity of the remaining database intact. Some users will only need the portion of the block chain that pertains to the coins they own or might receive in the future. At the present time however, all users of the Bitcoin software receive the entire database over the peer-to-peer network after running the software the first time. As of April 2012, this database is approximately 1.2 gigabytes (raw block data without any indexing or optimization).
] |date=4 December 2024 |url=https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1BVJt |access-date=4 December 2024 |publisher=]}}</ref>}} December 1, 2014 - <br> December 4, 2024]]
In 2020, some major companies and institutions started to acquire bitcoin: ] invested $250 million in bitcoin as a ],<ref>{{Cite news |date=13 September 2021 |title=MicroStrategy buys another $250m worth of bitcoin in hope of 100X price growth |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/microstrategy-bitcoin-crypto-price-prediction-b1919178.html |access-date=22 November 2023 |work=] |first=Anthony |last=Cuthbertson |language=en |archive-date=22 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231122163924/https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/microstrategy-bitcoin-crypto-price-prediction-b1919178.html |url-status=live }}</ref> ], $50 million,<ref>{{cite news |author=Oliver Effron |title=Square just bought $50 million in bitcoin |url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/08/business/square-bitcoin-crypto-investment/index.html |access-date=22 October 2020 |work=CNN |archive-date=24 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201024101610/https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/08/business/square-bitcoin-crypto-investment/index.html |url-status=live }}</ref> and ], $100 million.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-10/169-year-old-insurer-massmutual-invests-100-million-in-bitcoin |title=169-Year-Old MassMutual Invests $100 Million in Bitcoin |date=11 December 2020 |work=Bloomberg |access-date=26 December 2020 |author=Olga Kharif |archive-date=19 December 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201219220543/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-10/169-year-old-insurer-massmutual-invests-100-million-in-bitcoin |url-status=live }}</ref> In November 2020, ] added support for bitcoin in the US.<ref>{{cite news |date=13 November 2020 |title=PayPal says all users in US can now buy, hold and sell cryptocurrencies |url=https://techcrunch.com/2020/11/12/paypal-says-all-users-in-u-s-can-now-buy-hold-and-sell-cryptocurrencies/ |access-date=26 November 2020 |work=Techcrunch |archive-date=24 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201124050031/https://techcrunch.com/2020/11/12/paypal-says-all-users-in-u-s-can-now-buy-hold-and-sell-cryptocurrencies/ |url-status=live }}</ref>


In February 2021, bitcoin's ] reached $1 trillion for the first time.<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Chavez-Dreyfuss |first1=Gertrude |last2=Wilson |first2=Tom |date=19 February 2021 |title=Bitcoin hits $1 trillion market cap, surges to fresh all-time peak |language=en-US |work=Reuters |url=https://www.reuters.com.article/idUSKBN2AJ0GC/ |access-date=24 November 2023}}</ref> In November 2021, the ] ] upgrade was activated, adding support for ]s, improved functionality of ]s and ].<ref>{{cite news |last=Sigalos |first=MacKenzie |date=14 November 2021 |title=Bitcoin's biggest upgrade in four years just happened – here's what changes |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/14/bitcoin-taproot-upgrade-what-it-means-for-investors.html |access-date=15 November 2021 |work=CNBC |archive-date=14 November 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211114215032/https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/14/bitcoin-taproot-upgrade-what-it-means-for-investors.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Before, bitcoin only used a custom ] with the ] algorithm to produce ].<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Van Hijfte |first1=Stijn |title=Blockchain Platforms: A Look at the Underbelly of Distributed Platforms |publisher=Morgan & Claypool Publishers |year=2020 |isbn=978-1681738925}}</ref>{{rp|101}} In September 2021, bitcoin became ] in ], alongside the US dollar.<ref name=BTCSVSept7FT/> In October 2021, the first bitcoin futures ] (ETF), called BITO, from ] was approved by the ] and listed on the ].<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-bitcoin-etf-is-almost-here-what-does-that-mean-for-investors-11634376601 |title=A Bitcoin ETF Is Here. What Does That Mean for Investors? |date=19 October 2021 |access-date=11 January 2024 |website=The Wall Street Journal |last=Wursthorn |first=Michael |url-access=subscription |archive-date=10 January 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240110200308/https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-bitcoin-etf-is-almost-here-what-does-that-mean-for-investors-11634376601 |url-status=live }}</ref>
===Difficulty===
When more people mine for coins {{definition|date=June 2012}}, and everything else stays the same, blocks will generate more quickly. In order to throttle the creation of blocks (and thus keep miners on a more even platform as well as keep the network stable and prevent unnecessary forking of the block chain), the ''difficulty'' of generating the next block is mathematically adjusted. Referring back to the ''Target'' section, a block is generated when a hash value is found that is less than a certain threshold (or, more simply, starts with more zeros). Since lower thresholds mean less possible hashes can be accepted, the more zeros a hash requires to start with, the more difficult it will be to find an acceptable hash. When mining increases (more clients mining or more efficient ways of mining are found), the difficulty increases, and when mining decreases, the difficulty decreases. This keeps block generation at about every 10 minutes per block.
{{Technical|section|date=May 2012}}
<!-- Because block solutions arise out of an independent random process, mathematics can describe block creation by the Bitcoin network as a ]. -->As more people use more (or less) computing power to try to generate valid blocks, the rate of block creation varies. To compensate for this growth and to keep the rate of block creation close to the desired average of one block every ten minutes, Bitcoin changes the ''difficulty'' of finding a valid block every 2016 blocks. Each node in the network adjusts the difficulty so the distribution mean is ''λ''&nbsp;=&nbsp;2016 blocks per two weeks, so that there are roughly ten minutes between the creation of new blocks on average (the wait times between events in a Poisson process follow an ]). The network sets the difficulty to the value that would have most likely caused the prior 2016 blocks to take two weeks to complete, given the same computational effort (according to the timestamps recorded in the blocks).<!--<ref>{{Cite web
|url= https://en.bitcoin.it/Difficulty
|title= Bitcoin documentation on difficulty
|accessdate = 26 May 2011
}}</ref>--> All nodes perform and enforce the same difficulty calculation.


In May and June 2022, the bitcoin price fell following the collapses of ], a ],<ref>{{cite news|last=Browne|first=Ryan|date=10 May 2022|title=Bitcoin investors are panicking as a controversial crypto experiment unravels|url=https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/10/bitcoin-btc-investors-panic-as-terrausd-ust-sinks-below-1-peg.html|work=CNBC|access-date=11 May 2022|archive-date=11 May 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220511021259/https://www.cnbc.com/2022/05/10/bitcoin-btc-investors-panic-as-terrausd-ust-sinks-below-1-peg.html|url-status=live}}</ref> and the ], a cryptocurrency loan company.<ref>{{cite news|last1=Milmo|first1=Dan|title=Bitcoin value slumps below $20,000 in cryptocurrencies turmoil|url=https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/jun/18/bitcoin-value-falls-cryptocurrency-markets-turmoil|access-date=19 June 2022|work=The Guardian|date=18 June 2022|language=en|archive-date=18 June 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220618231120/https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/jun/18/bitcoin-value-falls-cryptocurrency-markets-turmoil|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last=Yaffe-Bellany|first=David|date=13 June 2022|title=Celsius Network Leads Crypto Markets Into Another Free Fall|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/13/technology/bitcoin-ether-price.html|work=The New York Times|access-date=14 June 2022|archive-date=14 June 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220614030021/https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/13/technology/bitcoin-ether-price.html|url-status=live}}</ref>
{{anchor|Bitcoin mining}}
In addition to the pending transactions confirmed in the block, a generating node adds a "generate" transaction, which awards new bitcoins to the operator of the node that generated the block. The system sets the payout of this generated transaction according to its defined inflation schedule. Nakamoto compared the generation of new coins by expending CPU time and electricity to gold miners expending resources to add gold to circulation.<ref name="whitepaper"/> The "miner" that generates a block also receives the fees that users have paid as an incentive to give particular transactions priority for faster confirmation.


In 2023, ordinals—]s (NFTs)—on bitcoin, went live.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Behrendt |first=Philipp |date=2023 |title=Taxation of the New Age: New Guidance for the World of Digital Assets |url=https://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/jtaxpp25&id=105&div=&collection= |journal=Journal of Tax Practice & Procedure |volume=25 |pages=47 |access-date=21 November 2023 |archive-date=21 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231121164911/https://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/jtaxpp25&id=105&div=&collection= |url-status=live }}</ref> As of June 2023, River Financial estimated that bitcoin had 81.7 million users, about 1% of the global population.<ref>{{cite web |date=2024-03-01 |title=As banks buy up bitcoins, who else are the 'Bitcoin whales'? |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-68434579 |access-date=2024-03-14 |website=BBC Home}}</ref> In January 2024, the first 11 US ] bitcoin ]s began trading, offering direct exposure to bitcoin for the first time on American stock exchanges.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Schmitt |first=Will |date=12 January 2024 |title=Bitcoin trading volumes surge after debut of long-awaited US ETFs |url=https://www.ft.com/content/f30ece62-0f1c-492a-8ccd-63ec9730573c |access-date=12 January 2024 |work=Financial Times |archive-date=12 January 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240112025105/https://www.ft.com/content/f30ece62-0f1c-492a-8ccd-63ec9730573c |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news|last1=Lang|first1=Hannah|title=US bitcoin ETFs see $4.6B in volume in first day of trading|url=https://www.reuters.com/technology/spot-bitcoin-etfs-start-trading-big-boost-crypto-industry-2024-01-11/|access-date=12 January 2024|work=Reuters|date=11 January 2024|language=en}}</ref> In December 2024, bitcoin price reached $100,000 for the first time, as ] ] promised to make the US the "crypto capital of the planet" and to stockpile bitcoin.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.reuters.com/technology/bitcoin-tops-100000-optimism-over-trump-crypto-plans-2024-12-05/|title=Bitcoin storms above $100,000 as Trump 2.0 fuels crypto euphoria|work=Reuters|date=2024-12-05}}</ref> The same month, ], the world's largest ], recommended investors to allocate up to 2% of their ] to bitcoin.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/blackrock-recommends-bitcoin-portfolio-weighting-up-2-interested-investors-2024-12-12/ | title=BlackRock recommends bitcoin portfolio weighting of up to 2% for interested investors|date=2024-12-12|first=Suzanne|last= McGee|work=Reuters}}</ref>
A strong ] exists between the price of bitcoins in the free market and the hashing power of the network at any specific time. Difficulty is the automatic stabilizer which allows to keep mining for bitcoins profitable in the long run for the most efficient miners. This holds true independently of the fluctuations in demand of Bitcoin in relation to other currencies.


==Design==
The proof-of-work problems are especially suitable to ] and specialized hardware. Bitcoin users often pool computational effort to increase the stability of the collected fees and subsidy they receive.
{{Main|Bitcoin protocol}}


===Units and divisibility===
The network never creates more than 50&nbsp;BTC per block and this amount will decrease over time towards zero, such that no more than 21 million will ever exist.<ref name="lwn" /> As this payout decreases, the incentive for users to run block-generating nodes will change to earning ].
The ] of the bitcoin system is the ''bitcoin''. It is most commonly represented with the ] ₿<ref name="unicode-10" /> and the ] BTC. However, the BTC code does not conform to ] as BT is the country code of Bhutan,<ref name="ssrn.3383734">{{Cite journal |last1=Alexander |first1=Carol |last2=Imeraj |first2=Arben |date=2019 |title=Introducing the BITIX: The Bitcoin Fear Gauge |url=https://www.ssrn.com/abstract=3383734 |journal=] |language=en |doi=10.2139/ssrn.3383734 |issn=1556-5068|quote=XBT satisfies the norm ‘ISO 4217’ by the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) as BTC goes against the name of Bhutan’s currency. In general, transaction instruments that are not national currencies, like gold or silver, begin with an X. However, the symbol XBT is not officially recognised by ISO.}}</ref> and ISO 4217 requires the first letter used in global commodities to be 'X'.<ref name="ssrn.3383734"/> XBT, a code that conforms to ] though not officially part of it,<ref name="ssrn.3383734"/> is used by ]<ref>{{Cite news |last=Romain Dillet |date=9 August 2013 |title=Bitcoin Ticker Available On Bloomberg Terminal For Employees |work=] |url=https://techcrunch.com/2013/08/09/bitcoin-ticker-available-on-bloomberg-terminal/ |url-status=live |access-date=2 November 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141101232825/http://techcrunch.com/2013/08/09/bitcoin-ticker-available-on-bloomberg-terminal/ |archive-date=1 November 2014}}</ref>


No uniform ] convention exists; some sources use ''Bitcoin'', capitalized, to refer to the technology and ], and ''bitcoin'', lowercase, for the unit of account.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Bustillos, Maria |date=2 April 2013 |title=The Bitcoin Boom |url=https://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/the-bitcoin-boom |url-status=live |magazine=] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140727185121/http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/the-bitcoin-boom |archive-date=27 July 2014 |access-date=22 December 2013}}</ref> The '']'' and the '']'' use the capitalized and lowercase variants without distinction.<ref>, '']''</ref><ref> {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220503092252/http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/bitcoin |date=3 May 2022 }}, '']''</ref>
===Transaction fees===
Miners have no obligation to include transactions in the blocks they try to solve. The client can associate a transaction fee with any transaction, giving miners an incentive to put the transaction in a block, as miners collect the transaction fees associated with all transactions included in blocks they solve. Very small transactions, or those that use relatively new coins, have low "priority" and the network may require a transaction fee to reduce spam. Most bitcoin clients, including Bitcoin-Qt version 0.5.2 (beta), enforce a minimum fee for low priority transactions of 0.0005 BTC.


One bitcoin is divisible to eight decimal places.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 5}} Units for smaller amounts of bitcoin are the millibitcoin (mBTC), equal to {{frac|1|1000}} bitcoin, and the satoshi{{efn|name=satoshi|Named after ]}} (sat), representing {{frac|1|{{val|100000000}}}} (one hundred millionth) bitcoin, the smallest amount possible.<ref name="satoshi unit" /> 100,000 satoshis are one mBTC.<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Katie Pisa |last2=Natasha Maguder |date=9 July 2014 |title=Bitcoin your way to a double espresso |work=CNN |url=http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/18/business/bitcoin-your-way-to-a-double-espresso/ |url-status=live |access-date=23 April 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150618072429/http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/18/business/bitcoin-your-way-to-a-double-espresso/ |archive-date=18 June 2015 }}</ref>
===Privacy===
Because transactions are broadcast to the entire network, they are inherently public. Unlike regular banking,<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/bitcoin-the-cryptoanarchists-answer-to-cash/0
|title= Bitcoin: The Crytoanarchists' Answer to Cash
|publisher= IEEE.org
|date= June 2012
|accessdate = 2012-06-05
}}</ref> which preserves customer privacy by keeping transaction records private, loose transactional privacy is accomplished in Bitcoin by using many multiple unique addresses for every wallet, while at the same time publishing all transactions. As an example, if Alice sends 123.45 BTC to Bob, the network creates a public record that allows anyone to see that 123.45 has been sent from one address to another. However, unless Alice or Bob make their ownership of these addresses publicly known, it is difficult for anyone else to connect the transaction with them. However, if someone connects an address to a user at any point they could follow back a series of transactions as each participant likely knows who paid them and may disclose that information on request or under duress.<ref name="An Analysis of Anonymity in the Bitcoin System" /><!--<ref>{{Cite web
|url= https://en.bitcoin.it/Anonymity
|title= Bitcoin documentation on anonymity
}}</ref>--><ref>{{cite web
|url= http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,15276051,00.html
|title= Bitcoin not so anonymous, Irish researcher says – Cyrus Farivar – Science and Technology
|publisher= Deutsche Welle
|date= 2011-06-01
|accessdate = 2011-07-29
}}</ref>


===Blockchain===
Jeff Garzik, one of the Bitcoin developers, explained as much in an interview and concluded that "attempting major illicit transactions with bitcoin, given existing statistical analysis techniques deployed in the field by law enforcement, is pretty damned dumb."<ref name="gawker-06-01-11">{{Cite news
{{further|Blockchain#Structure and design}}
|url= http://gawker.com/5805928/the-underground-website-where-you-can-buy-any-drug-imaginable
As a ] system, bitcoin operates without a central authority or single administrator,<ref name=Gervais2014>{{Cite journal |last1=Gervais |first1=Arthur |last2=Karame |first2=Ghassan O. |last3=Capkun |first3=Vedran |last4=Capkun |first4=Srdjan |date=May 2014 |title=Is Bitcoin a Decentralized Currency? |url=https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6824541 |journal=] |volume=12 |issue=3 |pages=54–60 |doi=10.1109/MSP.2014.49 |s2cid=13948781 |issn=1540-7993 |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=19 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231119101600/https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/6824541/ |url-status=live }}</ref> so that anyone can create a new bitcoin address and transact without needing any approval.{{r|Antonopoulos2014|page=ch. 1}} This is accomplished through a specialized ] called a '']'' that records bitcoin transactions.{{r|econbc}}
|title= The Underground Website Where You Can Buy Any Drug Imaginable
|first= Adrian
|last= Chen
|newspaper= Gawker
|date= 1 June 2011
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|url= http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/libertarian-dream-a-site-where-you-buy-drugs-with-digital-dollars/239776/
|title= Libertarian Dream? A Site Where You Buy Drugs With Digital Dollars – Alexis Madrigal – Technology
|publisher= The Atlantic
|date= 2011-06-01
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref>
He also said "We are working with the government to make sure indeed the long arm of the government can reach Bitcoin... the only way bitcoins are gonna be successful is working with regulation and with the government."<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYiWHNkZIes
|title= CBSNewsOnline: BitCoin: The Future of Currency
}}</ref>


The blockchain is implemented as an ordered list of ''blocks''. Each block contains a ] ] of the previous block,<ref name="econbc" /> chaining them in chronological order.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 7}}<ref name="econbc" /> The blockchain is maintained by a ] network.<ref name=JEP/>{{rp|215–219}} Individual blocks, public addresses, and transactions within blocks are public information, and can be examined using a blockchain explorer.<ref>{{Cite web| url=https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/ir/2021/NIST.IR.8301.pdf| publisher=National Institute of Standards Technology (NIST)| access-date=29 December 2022| title=Blockchain Networks: Token Design and Management Overview| page=32| archive-date=24 December 2022| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221224003108/https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/ir/2021/NIST.IR.8301.pdf| url-status=live}}</ref>
==Client==
]


Nodes validate and broadcast transactions, each maintaining a copy of the blockchain for ownership verification.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Sparkes, Matthew |date=9 June 2014 |title=The coming digital anarchy |work=The Daily Telegraph |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/10881213/The-coming-digital-anarchy.html |url-status=live |access-date=7 January 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150123190900/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/10881213/The-coming-digital-anarchy.html |archive-date=23 January 2015}}</ref> A new block is created every 10 minutes on average, updating the blockchain across all nodes without central oversight. This process tracks bitcoin spending, ensuring each bitcoin is ]. Unlike a traditional ledger that tracks physical currency, bitcoins exist digitally as ].<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 5}}
Read-only access to bitcoin addresses can be achieved using various websites or software to query the number of bitcoins associated with any address. Also, the transaction history of all bitcoins is freely available to query, and because all transactions are added to the bitcoin block chain, which is a distributed database formed by all bitcoin participants, a user's bitcoin software does not need to be running for that user to receive bitcoins.


===Addresses and transactions===
In order to be able to send bitcoins from an address (such as when purchasing products or other currencies) one must be in possession of the private key associated with that address. These are typically referred to as "wallets", and the wallet, or private key, should be considered as valuable as the bitcoins associated (or received in the future) with the address to which the private key belongs.
]
In the blockchain, bitcoins are linked to specific addresses that are hashes of a ]. Creating an address involves generating a random ] and then computing the corresponding address. This process is almost instant, but the reverse (finding the private key for a given address) is nearly impossible.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 4}} Publishing a bitcoin address does not risk its private key, and it is extremely unlikely to accidentally generate a used key with funds. To use bitcoins, owners need their private key to ] transactions, which are verified by the network using the public key, keeping the private key secret.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 5}}


Bitcoin transactions use a ]-like ],{{r|Antonopoulos2014|p=ch. 5}} involving one or more inputs and outputs. When sending bitcoins, a user specifies the recipients' addresses and the amount for each output. This allows sending bitcoins to several recipients in a single transaction. To prevent double-spending, each input must refer to a previous unspent output in the blockchain.<ref name="EconOfBTC">{{Cite conference |last1=Kroll |first1=Joshua A. |last2=Davey |first2=Ian C. |last3=Felten |first3=E. |title=The Economics of Bitcoin Mining, or Bitcoin in the Presence of Adversaries |conference=The Twelfth Workshop on the Economics of Information Security (WEIS 2013) |location=Washington, DC|date= 11–12 June 2013|s2cid=2794725 }}</ref> Using multiple inputs is similar to using multiple coins in a cash transaction. As in a cash transaction, the sum of inputs can exceed the intended sum of payments. In such a case, an additional output can return the change back to the payer.<ref name="EconOfBTC" /> Unallocated input satoshis in the transaction become the transaction fee.<ref name="EconOfBTC" />
Wallets can be kept offline (i.e. not connected to the internet), and this is safer than storing a wallet online. Encrypting the wallet is also recommended. The more bitcoins that can be accessed using the wallet, the greater the effort that is recommended in keeping it secure.


Losing a private key means losing access to the bitcoins, with no other proof of ownership accepted by the ].<ref name=JEP/> For instance, in 2013, a user lost ₿7,500, valued at US$7.5 million, by accidentally discarding a ] with the private key.<ref>{{Cite news |date=29 November 2013 |title=Man Throws Away 7,500 Bitcoins, Now Worth $7.5 Million |work=CBS DC |url=http://washington.cbslocal.com/2013/11/29/man-throws-away-7500-bitcoins-now-worth-7-5-million/ |url-status=live |access-date=23 January 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140115062630/http://washington.cbslocal.com/2013/11/29/man-throws-away-7500-bitcoins-now-worth-7-5-million/ |archive-date=15 January 2014}}</ref> It is estimated that around 20% of all bitcoins are lost.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Krause |first=Elliott |date=5 July 2018 |title=A Fifth of All Bitcoin Is Missing. These Crypto Hunters Can Help |work=The Wall Street Journal |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-fifth-of-all-bitcoin-is-missing-these-crypto-hunters-can-help-1530798731 |url-status=live |access-date=8 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180709010939/https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-fifth-of-all-bitcoin-is-missing-these-crypto-hunters-can-help-1530798731 |archive-date=9 July 2018}}</ref> The private key must also be kept secret as its exposure, such as through a ], can lead to theft of the associated bitcoins.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 10}}<ref>{{Cite news |last=Jeffries |first=Adrianne |date=19 December 2013 |title=How to steal Bitcoin in three easy steps |work=The Verge |url=https://www.theverge.com/2013/12/19/5183356/how-to-steal-bitcoin-in-three-easy-steps |url-status=live |access-date=17 January 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190727141228/https://www.theverge.com/2013/12/19/5183356/how-to-steal-bitcoin-in-three-easy-steps |archive-date=27 July 2019}}</ref> {{As of|2017|12}}, approximately ₿980,000 had been stolen from ]s.<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Harney |first1=Alexandra |last2=Stecklow |first2=Steve |date=16 November 2017 |title=Twice burned – How Mt. Gox's bitcoin customers could lose again |work=Reuters |url=https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/bitcoin-gox/ |url-status=live |access-date=6 September 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190829052101/https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/bitcoin-gox/ |archive-date=29 August 2019}}</ref>
Online wallets are usually that which is contained within the bitcoin client software, or could be an "ewallet" which is usually a web-based bitcoin client which serves multiple users.


===Mining===
Bitcoin payments are normally displayed to the receiver ], but the client initially displays them as ''unconfirmed'', because the bitcoin system cannot yet assure that the transaction is permanent. The network may invalidate a transaction because of a conflict (such as the client sending the same bitcoins to two different receivers). This may happen if a sender malfunctions, or if a sender intentionally attempts to ] a receiver. When the network processes the transaction, it adds an increasing number of confirmations every time the network extends the block-chain.
{{See also|Bitcoin protocol#Mining}}
] with large amounts of mining hardware]]
The mining process in bitcoin involves maintaining the blockchain through computer ]. Miners group and broadcast new transactions into blocks, which are then verified by the network.<ref name="econbc">{{Cite news |date=31 October 2015 |title=The great chain of being sure about things |newspaper=The Economist |url=https://www.economist.com/briefing/2015/10/31/the-great-chain-of-being-sure-about-things |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=4 December 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231204154941/https://www.economist.com/briefing/2015/10/31/the-great-chain-of-being-sure-about-things |url-status=live }}</ref> Each block must contain a proof of work (PoW) to be accepted,<ref name="econbc" /> involving finding a ] number that, combined with the block content, produces a ] numerically smaller than the network's ''difficulty target''.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 8}} This PoW is simple to verify but hard to generate, requiring many attempts.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 8}} PoW forms the basis of bitcoin's ].<ref name=Mingxiao2017>{{Cite conference |last1=Mingxiao |first1=Du |last2=Xiaofeng |first2=Ma |last3=Zhe |first3=Zhang |last4=Xiangwei |first4=Wang |last5=Qijun |first5=Chen |date=5–8 October 2017 |title=A review on consensus algorithm of blockchain |url=https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8123011 |publisher=IEEE |pages=2567–2572 |doi=10.1109/SMC.2017.8123011 |isbn=978-1-5386-1645-1 |conference=2017 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics (SMC) |location=Banff, AB, Canada |access-date=29 November 2023 |archive-date=24 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231124215821/http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8123011 |url-status=live }}</ref>


The difficulty of generating a block is ] based on the ] by changing the difficulty target, which is recalibrated every 2,016 blocks (approximately two weeks) to maintain an average time of ten minutes between new blocks. The process requires significant computational power and specialized ].<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 8}}<ref>{{cite news |date=4 January 2014 |url=http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2014/01/04/2003580449 |title=Bitcoin boom benefiting TSMC: report |newspaper=] |access-date=22 October 2021 |archive-date=29 January 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230129102127/https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2014/01/04/2003580449 |url-status=live }}</ref>
The process of confirming a transaction is accomplished by solving a computationally difficult ] problem.<ref name="bie">{{cite web
|url=http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/06/bitcoin-inside-the-encrypted-peer-to-peer-currency.ars
|title= Bitcoin: inside the encrypted, peer-to-peer digital currency
|author= Thomas Lowenthal
|date= 8 June 2011
|work= Ars Technica
|accessdate = 14 June 2011
}}</ref>
The problem is based on data from the transactions that must be confirmed, as well as the entire previous transaction history. This process makes it infeasible for an attacker to rewrite the transaction history without having more computing power than the rest of the bitcoin system. Nodes that process blocks of transactions are rewarded by receiving a programmed amount of bitcoin, which arises "out of thin air," as well as any transaction fees associated with the transactions they process. This compensates the operators of these systems for their computational work used to secure bitcoin transactions against reversal, and also accomplishes the initial ] for the bitcoin system as a whole. The network automatically adjusts the difficulty of the proof-of-work problem to maintain the average time between new blocks at ten minutes. All participating systems check the validity of every transaction and of every block and ignore any that violate the rules, such as blocks that bring the wrong amount of new bitcoin into existence, or transactions that would involve one sender spending the same bitcoin twice.


Miners who successfully find a new block can collect transaction fees from the included transactions and a set reward in bitcoins.<ref name="bloombergvance111413">{{Cite magazine |last=Ashlee |first= Vance |author-link=Ashlee Vance |date=14 November 2013 |title=2014 Outlook: Bitcoin Mining Chips, a High-Tech Arms Race |url=http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-11-14/2014-outlook-bitcoin-mining-chips-a-high-tech-arms-race |url-status=dead |magazine=] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131121225123/http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-11-14/2014-outlook-bitcoin-mining-chips-a-high-tech-arms-race |archive-date=21 November 2013 |access-date=24 November 2013}}</ref> To claim this reward, a special transaction called a ''coinbase'' is included in the block, with the miner as the payee. All bitcoins in existence have been created through this type of transaction.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 8}} This reward is halved every 210,000 blocks until ₿21&nbsp;million,{{efn|name=supply|The exact number is ₿20,999,999.9769.{{r|Antonopoulos2014|page=ch. 8}}}} with new bitcoin issuance slated to end around 2140. Afterward, miners will only earn from transaction fees. These fees are determined by the transaction's size and the amount of data stored, measured in satoshis per byte.<ref>{{cite news |first1=Ritchie S. |last1=King |first2=Sam |last2=Williams |first3=David |last3=Yanofsky |date=17 December 2013 |title=By reading this article, you're mining bitcoins |url=http://qz.com/154877/by-reading-this-page-you-are-mining-bitcoins |work=] |access-date=17 December 2013 |archive-date=17 December 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131217221429/http://qz.com/154877/by-reading-this-page-you-are-mining-bitcoins/ |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name="EconOfBTC" /><ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 8}}
==={{anchor|BitCoinJ}} Implementations===
Protocol implementations include the original ] Bitcoin codebase, ] (not based on the original codebase) and an open source implementation in ] called .<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://news.slashdot.org/story/11/03/23/0210207/Google-Engineer-Releases-Open-Source-Bitcoin-Client
|title= Google Engineer Releases Open Source Bitcoin Client
|author= angry tapir, timothy
|date= 23 March 2011
|publisher= ]
|accessdate = 2011-05-18
}}</ref>


The proof of work system and the chaining of blocks make blockchain modifications very difficult, as altering one block requires changing all subsequent blocks. As more blocks are added, modifying older blocks becomes increasingly challenging.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Hampton |first=Nikolai |date=5 September 2016 |title=Understanding the blockchain hype: Why much of it is nothing more than snake oil and spin |work=] |url=http://www.computerworld.com.au/article/606253/understanding-blockchain-hype-why-much-it-nothing-more-than-snake-oil-spin/ |url-status=live |access-date=5 September 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160906171838/http://www.computerworld.com.au/article/606253/understanding-blockchain-hype-why-much-it-nothing-more-than-snake-oil-spin/ |archive-date=6 September 2016}}</ref><ref name="econbc" /> In case of disagreement, nodes trust the longest chain, which required the greatest amount of effort to produce.<ref name=Mingxiao2017/> To tamper or censor the ledger, one needs to control the majority of the global ].<ref name=Mingxiao2017/> The high cost required to reach this level of computational power ] the bitcoin blockchain.<ref name=Mingxiao2017/>
==Currency==
{{ infobox currency
| image_1 = Bitcoin.png
| image_background_1 =
| image_title_1 =
| image_width_1 = 126
| image_2 =
| image_background_2 =
| image_title_2 =
| image_width_2 =
| iso_code = BTC</code> ]
| issuing_authority =
| issuing_authority_title =
| issuing_authority_website =
| date_of_introduction = 3 January 2009
| date_of_introduction_source =
| unofficial_users =
| using_countries =
| inflation_rate =
| inflation_source_date =
| inflation_method =
| euro_replace_non_cash =
| euro_replace_cash =
| ERM_fixed_rate =
| ERM_band =
| pegged_with =
| pegged_by =
| symbol = B⃦ <small>(de facto)<br>though ฿ sometimes used for font compatibility</small>
| symbol_subunit_1 = <!-- thru |symbol_subunit_5 = -->
| nickname =
| nickname_subunit_1 = <!-- thru |nickname_subunit_5 = -->
| plural = Bitcoins
}}


] is controversial and has attracted the attention of regulators, ].<ref name=Stoll2023>{{Cite report |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/resrep51839 |title=Climate Impacts of Bitcoin Mining in the U.S. |last1=Stoll |first1=Christian |last2=Klaaßen |first2=Lena |date=June 2023 |publisher=MIT Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research |last3=Gallersdörfer |first3=Ulrich |last4=Neumüller |first4=Alexander |series=Working Paper Series |access-date=24 November 2023 |archive-date=18 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231118132421/https://www.jstor.org/stable/resrep51839 |url-status=live }}</ref> {{As of|2022}}, a ] study by the ] (CCAF) estimated that bitcoin mining represented {{sigfig|0.38|1}}% of ].<ref name=Messina2023>{{Cite web |last=Messina |first=Irene |date=31 August 2023 |title=Bitcoin electricity consumption: an improved assessment |url=https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/2023/bitcoin-electricity-consumption |access-date=7 September 2023 |website=] |language=en-GB |archive-date=7 September 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230907181818/https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/2023/bitcoin-electricity-consumption/ |url-status=live }}</ref> Another 2022 non-peer-reviewed commentary published in '']'' estimated that bitcoin mining was responsible for {{sigfig|0.19|1}}% of world greenhouse gas emissions.<ref name= deVries2022>{{Cite journal |last1=de Vries |first1=Alex |last2=Gallersdörfer |first2=Ulrich |last3=Klaaßen |first3=Lena |last4=Stoll |first4=Christian |date=16 March 2022 |title=Revisiting Bitcoin's carbon footprint |journal=] |volume=6 |issue=3 |page=499 |doi=10.1016/j.joule.2022.02.005 |s2cid=247143939 |issn=2542-4351|doi-access=free |bibcode=2022Joule...6..498D }}</ref> About half of the electricity used is generated through ]s.<ref name=NYT20220116>{{Cite news |last1=Huang |first1=Jon |last2=O'Neill |first2=Claire |last3=Tabuchi |first3=Hiroko |date=3 September 2021 |title=Bitcoin Uses More Electricity Than Many Countries. How Is That Possible? |work=] |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/09/03/climate/bitcoin-carbon-footprint-electricity.html |issn=0362-4331 |access-date=16 January 2022 |archive-date=17 February 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230217105559/https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/09/03/climate/bitcoin-carbon-footprint-electricity.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Moreover, mining hardware's short lifespan results in ].<ref name=deVries2021/> The amount of electrical energy consumed, and the e-waste generated, is comparable to that of Greece and the Netherlands, respectively.<ref name=deVries2021>{{Cite journal |last1=de Vries |first1=Alex |last2=Stoll |first2=Christian |date=December 2021 |title=Bitcoin's growing e-waste problem |url=https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921344921005103 |journal=Resources, Conservation and Recycling |volume=175 |page=105901 |doi=10.1016/j.resconrec.2021.105901 |bibcode=2021RCR...17505901D |s2cid=240585651 |issn=0921-3449 |access-date=24 November 2023 |archive-date=23 November 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211123145025/https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0921344921005103 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref name= deVries2022/>
Unlike conventional ], Bitcoin has no centralized issuing authority.<ref name="ars-06-08-11">
{{Cite news
|first= Thomas
|last= Lowenthal
|title= Bitcoin: inside the encrypted, peer-to-peer digital currency
|newspaper= Ars Technica
|date= 8 June 2011
|url= http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/06/bitcoin-inside-the-encrypted-peer-to-peer-currency.ars
}}</ref><ref>{{cite news
|author= Sponsored by
|url= http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/06/virtual-currency
|title= Virtual currency: Bits and bob
|publisher= The Economist
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|last= Geere
|first= Duncan
|url= http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-05/16/bitcoin-p2p-currency
|title= Peer-to-peer currency Bitcoin sidesteps financial institutions (Wired UK)
|publisher= Wired.co.uk
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref> The network is programmed to increase the money supply as a ] until the total number of bitcoins reaches 21 million BTC.<ref name="ars-06-08-11"/> {{As of|2012}}, over 8 million of the total 21 million BTC have been mined.<ref>{{cite web
|title= Total Number of Bitcoins in Existence
|url= http://blockexplorer.com/q/totalbc
|work= Bitcoin Block Explorer
|accessdate = 2012-01-10
}}</ref> By 2013 half of the total supply will be generated, and by 2017, 3/4 will be generated. To ensure sufficient granularity of the ], clients can divide each BTC unit down to eight decimal places (a total of 2.1&nbsp;×&nbsp;10<sup>15</sup> or 2.1 quadrillion units).<ref name="lwn">{{Cite news
|author= Nathan Willis
|date= 2010-11-10
|title= Bitcoin: Virtual money created by CPU cycles
|publisher= ]
|url= http://lwn.net/Articles/414452/
}}</ref> This smallest unit is colloquially called a "Satoshi".


===Privacy and fungibility===
Although the network makes the complete history of every bitcoin transaction public, it can be difficult to associate bitcoin identities with real-life identities.<ref name="An Analysis of Anonymity in the Bitcoin System">Fergal Reid and Martin Harrigan (24 July 2011). . An Analysis of Anonymity in the Bitcoin System.</ref> This property makes bitcoin transactions attractive to some sellers of illegal products who assume police will not go to the trouble.<ref name="Forbes">Andy Greenberg (20 April 2011). . Forbes Magazine.</ref><ref>{{cite web
Bitcoin is ]ous, with funds linked to addresses, not real-world identities. While the owners of these addresses are not directly identified, all transactions are public on the blockchain. Patterns of use, like spending coins from multiple inputs, can hint at a common owner. Public data can sometimes be matched with known address owners.<ref>{{cite news |last=Simonite |first=Tom |date=5 September 2013 |title=Mapping the Bitcoin Economy Could Reveal Users' Identities |url=https://www.technologyreview.com/2013/09/05/176558/mapping-the-bitcoin-economy-could-reveal-users-identities/ |access-date=2 April 2014 |work=] |archive-date=27 September 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200927062235/https://www.technologyreview.com/2013/09/05/176558/mapping-the-bitcoin-economy-could-reveal-users-identities/ |url-status=live }}</ref> ] might also need to collect personal data as per legal requirements.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Lee, Timothy |date=21 August 2013 |title=Five surprising facts about Bitcoin |newspaper=The Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/21/five-surprising-facts-about-bitcoin-2 |access-date=21 November 2023 |archive-date=9 July 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220709135222/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/21/five-surprising-facts-about-bitcoin-2/ |url-status=live }}</ref> For enhanced ], users can generate a new address for each transaction.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=McMillan, Robert |date=6 June 2013 |title=How Bitcoin lets you spy on careless companies |url=https://www.wired.com/2013/06/bitcoin-retai/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140209202222/http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-06/06/bitcoin-retail |archive-date=9 February 2014 |access-date=3 April 2020 |magazine=] }}</ref>
|last= Madrigal
|first= Alexis
|title= Libertarian Dream? A Site Where You Buy Drugs With Digital Dollars
|publisher= ]
|date= 2011-06-01
|url= http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/libertarian-dream-a-site-where-you-buy-drugs-with-digital-dollars/239776/
|accessdate = 2011-06-05
}}</ref>


In the bitcoin network, each bitcoin is treated equally, ensuring basic ]. However, users and applications can choose to differentiate between bitcoins. While wallets and software treat all bitcoins the same, each bitcoin's transaction history is recorded on the blockchain. This public record allows for ], where users can identify and potentially reject bitcoins from controversial sources.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Anderson |first1=Ross |last2=Shumailov |first2=Ilia |last3=Ahmed |first3=Mansoor |title=Security Protocols XXVI |chapter=Making Bitcoin Legal |series=Lecture Notes in Computer Science |date=24 November 2018 |volume=11286 |chapter-url=https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/making-bitcoin-legal |language=en |publisher=Springer |pages=243–253 |doi=10.1007/978-3-030-03251-7_29 |isbn=978-3-030-03250-0 |editor-last=Matyáš |editor-first=Vashek |editor2-last=Švenda |editor2-first=Petr |editor3-last=Stajano |editor3-first=Frank |editor4-last=Christianson |editor4-first=Bruce |access-date=24 November 2023 |archive-date=24 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231124165246/https://www.research.ed.ac.uk/en/publications/making-bitcoin-legal |url-status=live }}</ref> For example, in 2012, Mt. Gox froze accounts containing bitcoins identified as stolen.<ref>{{Cite conference |last1=Möser |first1=Malte |last2=Böhme |first2=Rainer |last3=Breuker |first3=Dominic |year=2013 |title=An Inquiry into Money Laundering Tools in the Bitcoin Ecosystem |url=https://maltemoeser.de/paper/money-laundering.pdf |conference=2013 APWG eCrime Researchers Summit |publisher=] |isbn=978-1-4799-1158-5 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180626110754/https://maltemoeser.de/paper/money-laundering.pdf |archive-date=26 June 2018 |access-date=19 June 2019 |url-status=live}}</ref>
=== Bitcoin as quasi-commodity money ===
Bitcoin shares characteristics of both ] and ], but does not fit properly in either category.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2000118 |title=Quasi-Commodity Money. Abstract |author=Selgin, George |accessdate=8 April 2012 }}</ref> Bitcoin supersedes commodity money in value density, recognizability and divisibility and it also matches fiat money as medium of exchange.{{citation needed|date=May 2012}} It also resembles commodity money in the fact that, at least during the expansion of the Bitcoin base, its value, assuming competing suppliers, is equal to its ] of production. On the other hand, fiat money commands a value far higher than its costs of production, which raises the risk of severe mismanagement by their monopolistic suppliers.


===Wallets===
For some of the reasons above, and for the fact that commodities are "naturally" scarce, while Bitcoin is scarce in a contrived way, and not subject to ]s in the usually understood sense, economist ] classifies Bitcoin as Quasi-Commodity money.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2000118 |title=Quasi-Commodity Money |author=Selgin, George |work=Prepared for the Liberty Fund symposium, “In Search of a Monetary Constitution Revisited,” Freiburg, Germany, April 19–22, 2012. Highly preliminary: please do not quote |accessdate=8 April 2012 }}</ref>
{{Broader|Cryptocurrency wallet}}
{{multiple image
| total_width = 600
| align = center
| image1 = Bitcoin-core-v0.10.0.png
| caption1 = Screenshot of ]
| image2 = Sample Bitcoin paper wallet.png
| caption2 = A paper wallet with the address as a ] while the private key is hidden
| image3 = 10elqpi.jpg
| caption3 = A hardware wallet which processes bitcoin transactions without exposing private keys
}}
Bitcoin wallets were the first ]s, enabling users to store the information necessary to transact bitcoins.<ref>{{cite news |first1=Adam |last1=Serwer |first2=Dana|last2= Liebelson |date=10 April 2013 |title=Bitcoin, Explained |url=https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/04/what-is-bitcoin-explained |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140427022315/https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/04/what-is-bitcoin-explained |archive-date=27 April 2014 |access-date=26 April 2014 |work=]}}</ref>{{r|Antonopoulos2014|p=ch. 1, glossary}} The first wallet program, simply named ''Bitcoin'', and sometimes referred to as the ''Satoshi client'', was released in 2009 by Nakamoto as ].<ref name="NY2011" /> ] is among the best known ]. ] of Bitcoin Core exist such as ].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Vigna |first=Paul |date=17 January 2016 |title=Is Bitcoin Breaking Up? |work=The Wall Street Journal |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/is-bitcoin-breaking-up-1453044493 |url-status=live |access-date=8 November 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160820144312/http://www.wsj.com/articles/is-bitcoin-breaking-up-1453044493 |archive-date=20 August 2016}}</ref> Wallets can be full clients, with a full copy of the blockchain to check the validity of mined blocks,{{r|Antonopoulos2014|p=ch. 1}} or lightweight clients, just to send and receive transactions without a local copy of the entire blockchain.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Gervais |first1=Arthur |last2=Capkun |first2=Srdjan |last3=Karame |first3=Ghassan O. |last4=Gruber |first4=Damian |title=Proceedings of the 30th Annual Computer Security Applications Conference |chapter=On the privacy provisions of Bloom filters in lightweight bitcoin clients |date=8 December 2014 |chapter-url=https://doi.org/10.1145/2664243.2664267 |series=ACSAC '14 |location=New York, NY, USA |publisher=Association for Computing Machinery |pages=326–335 |doi=10.1145/2664243.2664267 |isbn=978-1-4503-3005-3 |s2cid=9161497 |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=21 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240421113526/https://consent.cookiebot.com/uc.js |url-status=live }}</ref> Third-party internet services called online wallets store users' credentials on their servers, making them susceptible of hacks.<ref>{{Cite news |first=Bill |last=Barhydt |date=4 June 2014 |title=3 reasons Wall Street can't stay away from bitcoin |publisher=CNBC |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2014/06/04/3-reasons-wall-street-cant-stay-away-from-bitcoin.html |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=4 December 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231204140256/https://www.cnbc.com/2014/06/04/3-reasons-wall-street-cant-stay-away-from-bitcoin.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Cold storage protects bitcoins from such hacks by keeping private keys offline, either through specialized hardware wallets or paper printouts.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Roberts |first=Daniel |date=15 December 2017 |title=How to send bitcoin to a hardware wallet |work=Yahoo Finance |url=https://finance.yahoo.com/news/send-bitcoin-hardware-wallet-140141385.html |url-status=live |access-date=17 February 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180217142235/https://finance.yahoo.com/news/send-bitcoin-hardware-wallet-140141385.html |archive-date=17 February 2018}}</ref><ref name="Antonopoulos2014" />{{rp|ch. 4}}


===Reception and concerns=== === Scalability and decentralization challenges ===
Nakamoto limited the block size to one ].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Mike Orcutt |date=19 May 2015 |title=Leaderless Bitcoin Struggles to Make Its Most Crucial Decision |work=MIT Technology Review |url=https://www.technologyreview.com/s/537486/leaderless-bitcoin-struggles-to-make-its-most-crucial-decision/ |access-date=15 November 2016 |archive-date=18 October 2017 |archive-url=https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20171018075515/https://www.technologyreview.com/s/537486/leaderless-bitcoin-struggles-to-make-its-most-crucial-decision/ |url-status=live }}</ref> The limited block size and frequency can lead to delayed processing of transactions, increased fees and a ].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Orcutt |first=Mike |date=19 May 2015 |title=Leaderless Bitcoin Struggles to Make Its Most Crucial Decision |work=MIT Technology Review |url=https://www.technologyreview.com/s/537486/leaderless-bitcoin-struggles-to-make-its-most-crucial-decision/ |url-status=live |access-date=22 June 2017 |archive-url=https://wayback.archive-it.org/all/20171018075515/https://www.technologyreview.com/s/537486/leaderless-bitcoin-struggles-to-make-its-most-crucial-decision/ |archive-date=18 October 2017}}</ref> The ], ] ] network, is a potential scaling solution.<ref name="Antonopoulos2014"/>{{rp|ch. 8}}
====Adoption====
],<ref>{{cite news
|last= Greenberg
|first= Andy
|url= http://blogs.forbes.com/andygreenberg/2011/06/14/wikileaks-asks-for-anonymous-bitcoin-donations/
|title= WikiLeaks Asks For Anonymous Bitcoin Donations – Andy Greenberg – The Firewall – Forbes
|publisher= Blogs.forbes.com
|date= 2011-06-14
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref> ],<ref>{{cite web
|url= https://freenetproject.org/donate.html
|title= /donate
|publisher= The Freenet Project
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref> ],<ref></ref> ],<ref></ref> ]<ref></ref> and others, accept donations in Bitcoin. The ] did so for a while but has since stopped, citing concerns about a lack of legal precedent about new currency systems, and because they "generally don't endorse any type of product or service – and Bitcoin is no exception."<ref>{{cite web
|url= https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/06/eff-and-bitcoin
|title= EFF and Bitcoin &#124; Electronic Frontier Foundation
|publisher= Eff.org
|date= 2011-06-14
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref>
Gavin Andresen, one of the main developers, is explicitly advising people "not to make heavy investments in bitcoins", calling it "kind of like a high risk investment".<ref>{{Cite episode
|title= /59/Bitcoin&nbsp;– a Digital, Decentralized Currency (at 31 min.)
|series= omega tau podcast
|url= http://omegataupodcast.net/2011/03/59-bitcoin-a-digital-decentralized-currency/
|airdate= 19 March 2011
}}</ref> Jered Kenna, CEO of TradeHill, formerly a major Bitcoin Exchange, also cautions eager investors and stated to the '']'' that "Bitcoin is still an experiment and not to bet the house".<ref>{{cite web|last=Jeffries |first=Adrianne |url=http://www.observer.com/2011/06/bit-omoney-whos-behind-the-bitcoin-bubble/ |title=Bit O’Money: Who’s Behind the Bitcoin Bubble? &#124; The New York Observer |publisher=Observer.com |date=2011-05-29 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> As of July 2011, some small businesses have started to adopt Bitcoin.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://en.bitcoin.it/Trade |title=Trade – Bitcoin |publisher=En.bitcoin.it |date= |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> ], a public company, accepts Bitcoin for its ] service.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.wuala.com/en/bitcoin |title=Secure Online Storage – Backup. Sync. Share. Access Everywhere |publisher=Wuala |date= |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> A frequent problem faced by retailers willing to accept Bitcoin is the high volatility of its exchange rate to the ], as well as the absence of ] to hedge this volatility (although contracts are available). In a review of the virtual currency, ] opined that hoarding by speculators represented one of the largest hindrances to accelerating its adoption.<ref name="TechReview">{{Cite journal
|url= http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/38392/
|author= James Surowiecki
|title= Cryptocurrency
|journal= Technology Review
|page= 106
|date= September/October 2011
}}</ref>


Research shows a trend towards centralization in bitcoin as miners join ] for stable income.<ref name="JEP">{{Cite journal |last1=Rainer Böhme |last2=Nicolas Christin |last3=Benjamin Edelman |last4=Tyler Moore |year=2015 |title=Bitcoin: Economics, Technology, and Governance |journal=] |volume=29 |issue=2 |pages=213–238 |doi=10.1257/jep.29.2.213 |doi-access=free |issn=0895-3309}}</ref>{{rp|215, 219–222}}<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Tschorsch |first1=Florian |last2=Scheuermann |first2=Björn |year=2016 |title=Bitcoin and Beyond: A Technical Survey on Decentralized Digital Currencies |journal=] |volume=18 |issue=3 |pages=2084–2123 |doi=10.1109/comst.2016.2535718 |s2cid=5115101}}</ref>{{rp|3}} If a single miner or pool controls more than 50% of the ], it would allow them to censor transactions and double-spend coins.<ref name=Gervais2014/> In 2014, mining pool ] reached 51% mining power, causing safety concerns, but later voluntarily capped its power at 39.99% for the benefit of the whole network.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Wilhelm |first=Alex |title=Popular Bitcoin Mining Pool Promises To Restrict Its Compute Power To Prevent Feared '51%' Fiasco |work=TechCrunch |url=https://techcrunch.com/2014/07/16/popular-bitcoin-mining-pool-promises-to-restrict-its-compute-power-to-prevent-feared-51-fiasco/ |url-status=live |access-date=25 January 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171205042008/https://techcrunch.com/2014/07/16/popular-bitcoin-mining-pool-promises-to-restrict-its-compute-power-to-prevent-feared-51-fiasco/ |archive-date=5 December 2017}}</ref> A few entities also dominate other parts of the ecosystem such as the client software, online wallets, and simplified payment verification (SPV) clients.<ref name=Gervais2014/>
====Initial distribution====
Bitcoins are awarded to Bitcoin miners for the solution to a difficult proof-of-work problem which confirms transactions and prevents double-spending. This incentive, as the Nakamoto white paper describes it, encourages "nodes to support the network, and provides a way to initially distribute coins into circulation, since no central authority issues them."<ref name="whitepaper" />


==Economics and usage==
The network currently requires over 1,000,000 times more work for confirming a block and receiving an award (50 BTC as of February 2012) than when the first blocks were confirmed.<ref>{{cite web
{{Main|Economics of bitcoin}}
|title= Bitcoin History Stats
|url= http://btcserv.net/bitcoin/history/
|accessdate = 12 December 2011
}} {{Dead link|date=June 2012}}</ref>
The network adjusts the difficulty every 2016 blocks based on the time taken to find the previous 2016 blocks such that one block is created roughly every 10 minutes.<!--<ref>{{Cite web
|title= Bitcoin Wiki article on "Difficulty"
|url= https://en.bitcoin.it/Difficulty
|accessdate = 11 December 2011
}}</ref>--> Thus the more computing power that is directed toward mining, the more computing power the network requires to complete a block confirmation and to receive the award. The network will also halve the award every 210,000 blocks, designed to occur about every four years.<!--<ref>{{Cite web
|title= Bitcoin wiki article on "Blocks"
|url= https://en.bitcoin.it/Blocks
|accessdate = 11 December 2011
}}</ref>-->


===Bitcoin's theoretical roots and ideology===
Those who chose to put computational and electrical resources toward mining early on had a greater chance at receiving awards for block generations. This served to make available enough processing power to process blocks. Indeed, without miners there are no transactions and the Bitcoin economy comes to a halt.
According to the ], the decentralization of money offered by bitcoin has its theoretical roots in the ], especially with ]'s '']'', in which he advocates a complete ] in the production, distribution and management of money to end the monopoly of ].<ref>{{cite book |author=European Central Bank |url=http://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/other/virtualcurrencyschemes201210en.pdf |title=Virtual Currency Schemes |year=2012 |publisher=] |isbn=978-92-899-0862-7 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121106053452/http://www.ecb.europa.eu/pub/pdf/other/virtualcurrencyschemes201210en.pdf |archive-date=6 November 2012 |url-status=live|oclc=1044382974|doi=10.2866/47380 }}</ref>{{rp|22}} Sociologist ] argues that the essence of the bitcoin ideology is to remove money from social, as well as governmental, control.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Dodd |first1=Nigel |date=May 2018 |title=The Social Life of Bitcoin |url=https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/69229/1/Dodd_The%20social%20life%20of%20Bitcoin_author_2017%20LSERO.pdf |journal=Theory, Culture & Society |volume=35 |issue=3 |pages=35–56 |doi=10.1177/0263276417746464 |s2cid=51914607 |issn=0263-2764 |authorlink1=Nigel Dodd |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=22 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231122163925/https://eprints.lse.ac.uk/69229/1/Dodd_The%20social%20life%20of%20Bitcoin_author_2017%20LSERO.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> '']'' describes bitcoin as "a ] project to create an online version of cash, a way for people to transact without the possibility of interference from malicious governments or banks".<ref name="30082018Economist" /> These philosophical ideas initially attracted ]s and ]s.<ref>{{cite news |last=Feuer |first=Alan |date=14 December 2013 |title=The Bitcoin Ideology |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/sunday-review/the-bitcoin-ideology.html |url-status=live |access-date=1 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180701222302/https://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/sunday-review/the-bitcoin-ideology.html |archive-date=1 July 2018}}</ref> Economist ] argues that cryptocurrencies like bitcoin are only used by bank skeptics and criminals.{{r|Krugman}}


=== Recognition as a currency and legal status ===
Some criticize Bitcoin for being a ] in that it rewards early adopters.<ref>{{cite web
{{Legal status of bitcoin|300px}}
|url= http://www.hightechforum.org/bitcoins-a-crypto-geek-ponzi-scheme/
] serves three purposes: a ], a ], and a ].<ref name="econ315">{{Cite news |date=15 March 2014 |title=Free Exchange. Money from nothing. Chronic deflation may keep Bitcoin from displacing its rivals. |newspaper=The Economist |url=https://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21599053-chronic-deflation-may-keep-bitcoin-displacing-its-fiat-rivals-money |url-status=live |access-date=25 March 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140325085119/http://www.economist.com/news/finance-and-economics/21599053-chronic-deflation-may-keep-bitcoin-displacing-its-fiat-rivals-money |archive-date=25 March 2014}}</ref> According to ''The Economist'' in 2014, bitcoin functions best as a medium of exchange.<ref name=econ315 /> In 2015, ''The Economist'' noted that bitcoins had three qualities useful in a currency: they are "hard to earn, limited in supply and easy to verify".<ref>{{Cite news |date=13 January 2015 |title=The magic of mining |newspaper=] |url=https://www.economist.com/news/business/21638124-minting-digital-currency-has-become-big-ruthlessly-competitive-business-magic |url-status=live |access-date=13 January 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150112165531/http://www.economist.com/news/business/21638124-minting-digital-currency-has-become-big-ruthlessly-competitive-business-magic |archive-date=12 January 2015}}</ref> However, a 2018 assessment by ''The Economist'' stated that cryptocurrencies met none of these three criteria.<ref name="30082018Economist">{{Cite news |date=30 August 2018 |title=Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are useless |newspaper=The Economist |url=https://www.economist.com/leaders/2018/08/30/bitcoin-and-other-cryptocurrencies-are-useless |url-status=live |access-date=4 September 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180904040905/https://www.economist.com/leaders/2018/08/30/bitcoin-and-other-cryptocurrencies-are-useless |archive-date=4 September 2018 }}</ref> Per some researchers, {{as of|2015|lc=yes}}, bitcoin functions more as a ] than as a currency.<ref name=JEP/> In 2014, economist ] wrote that bitcoin has potential as a unit of account for measuring the relative value of goods, as with Chile's ], but that "Bitcoin in its present form... doesn't really solve any sensible economic problem".<ref name="Shiller">{{Cite news |last=Shiller |first=Robert |date=1 March 2014 |title=In Search of a Stable Electronic Currency |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/02/business/in-search-of-a-stable-electronic-currency.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141024120222/http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/02/business/in-search-of-a-stable-electronic-currency.html |archive-date=24 October 2014}}</ref> François R. Velde, Senior Economist at the ], described bitcoin as "an elegant solution to the problem of creating a digital currency".<ref>{{cite web |last=Velde |first=François |date=December 2013 |title=Bitcoin: A primer |url=https://www.chicagofed.org/digital_assets/publications/chicago_fed_letter/2013/cfldecember2013_317.pdf |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141026065254/http://www.chicagofed.org/digital_assets/publications/chicago_fed_letter/2013/cfldecember2013_317.pdf |archive-date=26 October 2014 |access-date=3 September 2016 |website=Chicago Fed letter |publisher=] |page=4 |issue=317}}</ref> David Andolfatto, Vice President at the ], stated that bitcoin is a threat to the establishment, which he argues is a good thing for the ] and other ]s, because it prompts these institutions to operate sound policies.<ref>{{cite news |last=Wile|first= Rob |date=6 April 2014 |title=St. Louis Fed Economist: Bitcoin Could Be A Good Threat To Central Banks |url=http://www.businessinsider.com/interview-with-david-andolfatto-2014-4 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924095030/http://www.businessinsider.com/interview-with-david-andolfatto-2014-4 |archive-date=24 September 2015 |access-date=16 April 2014 |work=]}}</ref>
|title= Bitcoins, a Crypto-Geek Ponzi Scheme
|accessdate = 15 June 2011
}}</ref>
While early Bitcoin miners may benefit more than later ones, the returns on their investments do not come at the expense of others participating in the Bitcoin economy. The return (on invested computing power and electricity) is the reward for doing useful work in the Bitcoin network by verifying blocks, and often costs nearly as much in electricity costs as they receive.


The ] varies substantially from one jurisdiction to another. Because of its decentralized nature and its global presence, regulating bitcoin is difficult. However, the use of bitcoin can be criminalized, and shutting down exchanges and the peer-to-peer economy in a given country would constitute a ] ban.<ref>{{cite news |first=Jacob |last=Weindling |date=18 September 2017 |title=China May Be Gearing Up to Ban Bitcoin |url=https://www.pastemagazine.com/politics/bitcoin/china-may-be-gearing-up-to-ban-bitcoin |work=] |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=22 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231122163924/https://www.pastemagazine.com/politics/bitcoin/china-may-be-gearing-up-to-ban-bitcoin |url-status=live }}</ref> The ] has attracted the attention of financial regulators, legislative bodies, and law enforcement.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Lavin|first= Tim |date=8 August 2013 |title=The SEC Shows Why Bitcoin Is Doomed |work=] |url=http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2013-08-08/did-the-sec-just-validate-bitcoin-no- |url-status=live |access-date=20 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140325214514/http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2013-08-08/did-the-sec-just-validate-bitcoin-no- |archive-date=25 March 2014}}</ref> Nobel-prize winning economist ] says that bitcoin's anonymity encourages ] and other crimes.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Montag |first=Ali |date=9 July 2018 |title=Nobel-winning economist: Authorities will bring down 'hammer' on bitcoin |publisher=CNBC |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/09/nobel-prize-winning-economist-joseph-stiglitz-criticizes-bitcoin.html |url-status=live |access-date=11 July 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180711200915/https://www.cnbc.com/2018/07/09/nobel-prize-winning-economist-joseph-stiglitz-criticizes-bitcoin.html |archive-date=11 July 2018}}</ref> This is the main justification behind bitcoin bans.<ref name=SunYin2019/> {{As of|2021|11}}, nine countries applied an absolute ban (Algeria, Bangladesh, China, Egypt, Iraq, Morocco, Nepal, Qatar, and Tunisia) while another 42 countries had an implicit ban.<ref name=LOC2021>{{cite web |title=Regulation of Cryptocurrency Around the World: November 2021 Update |url=https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/llglrd/2021687419/2021687419.pdf |publisher=United States Library of Congress |access-date=28 December 2022 |archive-date=24 December 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211224043203/https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/llglrd/2021687419/2021687419.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>{{Update inline|reason=Many things have changed since Nov 2021.|date=November 2023}} Bitcoin is only ] in ].<ref name=BTCSVSept7FT/>
====Prices====
]
Prices fluctuate relative to goods and services more than more widely accepted currencies, since the price of a bitcoin is not yet ].<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://www.dailytech.com/Digital+Black+Friday+First+Bitcoin+Depression+Hits/article21877.htm
|title= Digital Black Friday: First Bitcoin "Depression" Hits
|publisher= DailyTech
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref>
Also, different exchanges quote different prices, implying the market is not yet ].<ref>{{cite web
|url= http://bitcoin-prices.com/
|title= Different Bitcoin Prices on different Exchanges
|date=
|accessdate = 2011-07-19
}}</ref>
On 19 June 2011, a security breach of the Mt. Gox Bitcoin Exchange (formerly the "Magic: the Gathering Online Exchange") caused the leaking of usernames, emails and ]ed passwords of over 60,000 users onto the Web. The price of a bitcoin briefly dropped to $0.01 on the Mt. Gox exchange (but remained unaffected on other exchanges) after a hacker allegedly used credentials from a Mt. Gox auditor's compromised computer to illegally transfer a large number of bitcoins to himself and sell them all, creating a massive "ask" order at any price. Within minutes the price rebounded to over $15 before Mt. Gox shut down their exchange and canceled all trades that happened during the hacking period.<ref></ref><ref></ref> The exchange rate of bitcoins quickly returned to near pre-crash values.<ref name="mick">Jason Mick, 19 June 2011, , DailyTech</ref><ref>Timothy B. Lee, 19 June 2011, , Ars Technica</ref><ref>Mark Karpeles, 20 June 2011, , Mt.Gox Support</ref><ref name="register1">{{Cite news
|title= Bitcoin collapses on malicious trade – Mt Gox scrambling to raise the Titanic
|url= http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/06/19/bitcoin_values_collapse_again/
|date= 2011-06-19
|author= Chirgwin, Richard
|publisher= The Register
}}</ref>


=== Use for payments ===
In May 2012, 1 BTC traded at around $5.00 USD. Taking into account the total number of Bitcoins in circulation, the market capitalization of the Bitcoin network stands at over 45 million USD.<ref> Bitcoin statistics</ref>
] accepting Bitcoin]]
{{As of|2018}}, bitcoin is rarely used in transactions with merchants,<ref name="FT08062018" /> but it is popular to ] online.<ref name=TheEconomist20120929>{{Cite news |title=Monetarists Anonymous |newspaper=The Economist |url=https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2012/09/29/monetarists-anonymous |date=29 September 2012 |access-date=22 November 2023 |issn=0013-0613 |archive-date=1 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220901043303/https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2012/09/29/monetarists-anonymous |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Ball |first=James |date=22 March 2013 |title=Silk Road: the online drug marketplace that officials seem powerless to stop |language=en-GB |work=The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/mar/22/silk-road-online-drug-marketplace |access-date=22 November 2023 |issn=0261-3077 |archive-date=12 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131012012106/http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/mar/22/silk-road-online-drug-marketplace |url-status=live }}</ref> Prices are not usually quoted in bitcoin and trades involve conversions into ] currencies.<ref name=JEP/> Commonly cited reasons for not using bitcoin include high costs, the inability to process ]s, high ], long transaction times, and ] (especially for small purchases).<ref name="FT08062018">{{Cite news |last=Murphy |first=Hannah |date=8 June 2018 |title=Who really owns bitcoin now? |work=Financial Times |url=https://www.ft.com/content/29259448-69b3-11e8-b6eb-4acfcfb08c11 |url-status=live |access-date=10 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180610051316/https://www.ft.com/content/29259448-69b3-11e8-b6eb-4acfcfb08c11 |archive-date=10 June 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Katz |first=Lily |date=12 July 2017 |title=Bitcoin Acceptance Among Retailers Is Low and Getting Lower |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-12/bitcoin-acceptance-among-retailers-is-low-and-getting-lower |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180125204553/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-12/bitcoin-acceptance-among-retailers-is-low-and-getting-lower |archive-date=25 January 2018 |access-date=25 January 2018 |work=Bloomberg News}}</ref> ''Bloomberg'' reported that bitcoin was being used for large-item purchases on the site ] and for cross-border payments to ]s.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Kharif |first=Olga |date=1 August 2018 |title=Bitcoin's Use in Commerce Keeps Falling Even as Volatility Eases |work=Bloomberg News|url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-01/bitcoin-s-use-in-commerce-keeps-falling-even-as-volatility-eases |url-status=live |access-date=2 August 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180802073219/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-01/bitcoin-s-use-in-commerce-keeps-falling-even-as-volatility-eases |archive-date=2 August 2018}}</ref> {{As of|2015}}, there was little sign of bitcoin use in international ]s despite high fees charged by banks and ] who compete in this market.<ref name=JEP/><ref>{{Cite news |last=Chan |first=Bernice |date=16 January 2015 |title=Bitcoin transactions cut the cost of international money transfers |work=] |url=https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/technology/article/1679904/bitcoin-transactions-cut-cost-international-money-transfers |url-status=live |access-date=31 May 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190531060301/https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/technology/article/1679904/bitcoin-transactions-cut-cost-international-money-transfers |archive-date=31 May 2019}}</ref> Despite associated risks and costs, in 2022, a growing use of bitcoin, alongside cash and cards, was reported in restaurant business.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/business/bitcoin-bitcoin-restaurants-start-accept-cryptocurrencies-rcna21211 |title=Bitcoin by bitcoin, restaurants start to accept cryptocurrencies |date=2022-04-11 |access-date=2024-10-07 |website=NBC News |last=Sheidlower |first=Noah}}</ref>


In September 2021, the ] made bitcoin ] in ], alongside the US dollar.<ref name=BTCSVSept7FT/> The adoption has been criticized internationally and within El Salvador.<ref name=BTCSVSept7FT/><ref>{{cite news |date=2 September 2021 |title=Majority of Salvadorans do not want bitcoin, poll shows |url=https://www.reuters.com/technology/majority-salvadorans-do-not-want-bitcoin-poll-shows-2021-09-02/ |access-date=30 November 2021 |work=Reuters |archive-date=30 November 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211130154620/https://www.reuters.com/technology/majority-salvadorans-do-not-want-bitcoin-poll-shows-2021-09-02/ |url-status=live }}</ref> In 2022, the ] (IMF) urged El Salvador to reverse its decision.<ref>{{cite news |date=26 January 2022 |title=IMF urges El Salvador to remove Bitcoin as legal tender |work=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-60135552 |access-date=26 January 2022 |archive-date=26 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220126154241/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-60135552 |url-status=live }}</ref> {{As of|2022}}, the use of ] remains low: 80% of businesses refused to accept it.<ref>{{cite report |title=Are Cryptocurrencies Currencies? Bitcoin as Legal Tender in El Salvador |last1=Alvarez |first1=Fernando |last2=Argente |first2=David |publisher=National Bureau of Economic Research |doi=10.3386/w29968 |page= |last3=Van Patten |first3=Diana |doi-access=free |publication-place=Cambridge, MA |year=2022}}</ref> In April 2022, the ] (CAR) adopted bitcoin as legal tender alongside the ],<ref>{{Cite news |date=28 April 2022 |title=Bitcoin Declared Legal Currency in Central African Republic |work=Bloomberg |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-28/bitcoin-is-declared-a-legal-currency-in-central-african-republic-l2isppnb |access-date=28 April 2022 |archive-date=28 April 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220428141222/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-28/bitcoin-is-declared-a-legal-currency-in-central-african-republic-l2isppnb |url-status=live }}</ref> but repealed the reform one year later.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Frequently Asked Questions on Central African Republic |url=https://www.imf.org/en/Countries/CAF/central-african-republic-qandas |access-date=11 August 2023 |website=International Monetary Fund |language=en |archive-date=11 August 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230811002905/https://www.imf.org/en/Countries/CAF/central-african-republic-qandas |url-status=live }}</ref>
====Security====
Until version 0.4.0, if an attacker had compromised the machine storing a particular Bitcoin wallet, then they could easily transfer any bitcoins to their own wallet. On 16 June 2011, computer security companies started publishing the discovery of ] that locates the wallet file on Windows computers and uploads it to a remote server.<ref>{{cite news
|author=
|url= http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/06/bitcoin-malware/
|title= New Malware Steals Your Bitcoin &#124; Threat Level
|publisher= Wired.com
|date= 16 June 2011
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
|first=Kevin
|last=Poulsen
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|author= Updated: 17 June 2011
|url= http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/all-your-bitcoins-are-ours
|title= All your Bitcoins are ours ... &#124; Symantec Connect Community
|publisher= Symantec.com
|date= 2011-06-17
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|url= http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid=2011-061615-3651-99
|title= Infostealer.Coinbit
|publisher= Symantec
|date= 2011-06-16
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|url= http://www.f-secure.com/weblog/archives/00002187.html
|title= Pickpocket Targets Wallets at Bitcoin Forum – F-Secure Weblog : News from the Lab
|publisher= F-secure.com
|date= 2011-06-17
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref>
Users could prevent this attack by encrypting the wallet file; however, Bitcoin clients did not build this functionality in until wxBitcoin version 0.4.0.<ref>{{cite web
|url= https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/commit/4e87d341f75f13bbd7d108c31c03886fbc4df56f
|title= Add wallet privkey encryption
|date= 2011-07-08
}}</ref>


Bitcoin is also used by some governments. For instance, the ] initially opposed cryptocurrencies, but later saw them as an opportunity to circumvent ].<ref>{{cite news |date=3 November 2020 |title=Iran Is Pivoting to Bitcoin |url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjppx3/iran-bitcoin-us-sanctions |work=] |last=Rasool |first=Mohammed |access-date=10 November 2020 |archive-date=3 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201103235640/https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjppx3/iran-bitcoin-us-sanctions |url-status=live }}</ref> Since 2020, Iran has required local bitcoin miners to sell bitcoin to the ], allowing the central bank to use it for imports.<ref name="aawsat202011">{{cite news |date=31 October 2020 |title=Iran: New Crypto Law Requires Selling Bitcoin Directly to Central Bank to Fund Imports |url=https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2596686/iran-new-crypto-law-requires-selling-bitcoin-directly-central-bank-fund-imports |work=] |access-date=31 October 2020 |archive-date=31 October 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201031235032/https://english.aawsat.com/home/article/2596686/iran-new-crypto-law-requires-selling-bitcoin-directly-central-bank-fund-imports |url-status=live }}</ref> Some ] also accept tax payments in bitcoin, including ] (])<ref>{{Cite news |date=21 September 2022 |title=Colorado accepts cryptocurrency to pay taxes, moving the state "tech forward" |url=https://www.denverpost.com/2022/09/21/colorado-accepts-cryptocurrency-taxes/ |first=Judith |last=Kohler |work=] |language=en-US |access-date=29 December 2022 |archive-date=29 December 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221229090417/https://www.denverpost.com/2022/09/21/colorado-accepts-cryptocurrency-taxes/ |url-status=live }}</ref> and ] (]).<ref>{{Cite news |date=3 September 2020 |title='Crypto Valley' canton to accept Bitcoin for tax payments |url=https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/-crypto-valley--canton-to-accept-bitcoin-for-tax-payments/46010364 |work=] |language=en |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=22 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231122163924/https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/-crypto-valley--canton-to-accept-bitcoin-for-tax-payments/46010364 |url-status=live }}</ref> As of 2023, the US government owned more than $5 billion worth of seized bitcoin.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Huang |first=Vicky Ge |title=Why the U.S. Government Has $5 Billion in Bitcoin |url=https://www.wsj.com/finance/currencies/federal-government-bitcoin-5-billion-78ce0938 |date=15 October 2023 |work=] |language=en-US |access-date=20 February 2024 |archive-date=20 February 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240220023509/https://www.wsj.com/finance/currencies/federal-government-bitcoin-5-billion-78ce0938 |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Castillo |first=Michael del |title=U.S. Government Owns Way More Bitcoin Than Any Other Country–So Why Aren't They Selling It? |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2023/06/16/us-government-owns-way-more-bitcoin-than-any-other-countryso-why-arent-they-selling-it |date=16 June 2023 |website=] |language=en |access-date=21 February 2024 |archive-date=21 February 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240221155659/https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2023/06/16/us-government-owns-way-more-bitcoin-than-any-other-countryso-why-arent-they-selling-it/ |url-status=live }}</ref>
], a leading Internet technology security researcher, investigated Bitcoin. His examination reached various conclusions on Bitcoin, anonymity and its future scalability. In the area of security of the basic model he concluded Nakamoto designed Bitcoin well. This relates to the underlying Bitcoin model rather than any particular attack against a specific client, such as described above.<ref>Dan Kaminsky Toorcon Seattle presentation slides, http://www.slideshare.net/dakami/bitcoin-8776098</ref>


===Use for investment and status as an economic bubble ===
====Extralegal uses====
{{Further|Cryptocurrency bubble}}
=====Covert "mining"=====
]
In June 2011, ] warned about the possibility of ]s engaging in covert "mining" of bitcoins (unauthorized use of computer resources to generate bitcoins),<ref>{{cite web|author=Updated: 17 June 2011 | Translations available: 日本語 |url=http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/bitcoin-botnet-mining |title=Bitcoin Botnet Mining &#124; Symantec Connect Community |publisher=Symantec.com |date=2011-06-17 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.zdnet.com/blog/security/researchers-find-malware-rigged-with-bitcoin-miner/8934 |title=Researchers find malware rigged with Bitcoin miner |publisher=ZDNet |date=2011-06-29 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> consuming computing cycles, using extra electricity and possibly increasing the temperature of the computer. Later that month, the ] caught an employee using the company's servers to generate bitcoins without permission.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://thenextweb.com/au/2011/06/23/abc-employee-caught-mining-for-bitcoins-on-company-servers/ |title=ABC employee caught mining for Bitcoins on company servers |publisher=The Next Web |date=2011-06-23 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> Some malware also uses the ] capabilities of the ]s built into many modern-day ]s.<ref>{{Cite news |url=http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/08/16/gpu_bitcoin_brute_forcing/ |title=Malware mints virtual currency using victim's GPU |date=16 August 2011<!-- 20:00 GMT -->|first=Dan |last=Goodin }}</ref> In mid August 2011, bitcoin miner botnets were found;<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/view/20211/researcher-discovers-distributed-bitcoin-cracking-trojan-malware/ |title=Infosecurity – Researcher discovers distributed bitcoin cracking trojan malware |publisher=Infosecurity-magazine.com |date=2011-08-19 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref> trojans infecting Mac OS X have also been uncovered.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.techworld.com.au/article/405849/mac_os_x_trojan_steals_processing_power_produce_bitcoins |title=Mac OS X Trojan steals processing power to produce Bitcoins – sophos, security, malware, Intego – Vulnerabilities – Security |publisher=Techworld |date=2011-11-01 |accessdate = 2012-01-24}}</ref>
{{As of|2018}}, the overwhelming majority of bitcoin transactions took place on ]s.<ref name="FT08062018" /> Since 2014, regulated bitcoin funds also allow ] to the asset or to ] as an investment.<ref>{{Cite news |date=10 July 2014 |title=Jersey approve Bitcoin fund launch on island |work=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-jersey-28247796 |url-status=live |access-date=10 July 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140710211917/http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-jersey-28247796 |archive-date=10 July 2014}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |date=18 December 2017 |title=Chicago Mercantile Exchange jumps into bitcoin futures |work=CBS News |url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/chicago-mercantile-exchange-jumps-into-bitcoin-futures/ |url-status=live |access-date=31 May 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190531054602/https://www.cbsnews.com/news/chicago-mercantile-exchange-jumps-into-bitcoin-futures/ |archive-date=31 May 2019}}</ref> Bitcoin is used as a ]:<ref>{{Cite news |date=2021-10-25 |title=Gold or Bitcoin? Store-of-value debate rages as Bitcoin grows |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/professional/insights/trading/gold-or-bitcoin-store-of-value-debate-rages-as-bitcoin-grows/ |access-date=2024-10-02 |work=Bloomberg Professional Services |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/goldman-sachs-says-bitcoin-will-compete-with-gold-store-value-2022-01-05/|title=Goldman Sachs says bitcoin will compete with gold as "store of value"|website=Reuters|date=2022-01-05}}</ref> individuals and companies such as the ]<ref>{{Cite news |last=Lee |first=Timothy B. |title=The $11 million in bitcoins the Winklevoss brothers bought is now worth $32 million |newspaper=The Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/11/09/the-11-million-in-bitcoins-the-winklevoss-brothers-bought-is-now-worth-32-million/ |url-status=live |access-date=11 August 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170706111658/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/11/09/the-11-million-in-bitcoins-the-winklevoss-brothers-bought-is-now-worth-32-million/ |archive-date=6 July 2017}}</ref> and ]'s companies ] and ] have massively invested in bitcoin.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Maidenberg |first1=Micah |last2=Driebusch |first2=Corrie |last3=Jin |first3=Berber |title=A Rare Look Into the Finances of Elon Musk's Secretive SpaceX |url=https://www.wsj.com/tech/behind-the-curtain-of-elon-musks-secretive-spacex-revenue-growth-and-rising-costs-2c828e2b |access-date=19 November 2023 |work=The Wall Street Journal |date=17 August 2023 |url-access=subscription |archive-date=17 August 2023 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20230817224420/https://www.wsj.com/tech/behind-the-curtain-of-elon-musks-secretive-spacex-revenue-growth-and-rising-costs-2c828e2b |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last1=Ostroff |first1=Caitlin |last2=Elliott |first2=Rebecca |date=8 February 2021 |title=Tesla Buys $1.5 Billion in Bitcoin |language=en-US |work=] |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/tesla-buys-1-5-billion-in-bitcoin-11612791688 |access-date=22 November 2023 |issn=0099-9660 |url-access=subscription |archive-date=6 January 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240106160013/https://www.wsj.com/articles/tesla-buys-1-5-billion-in-bitcoin-11612791688 |url-status=live }}</ref> Bitcoin wealth is highly concentrated, with 0.01% holding 27% of in-circulation currency, as of 2021.<ref>{{Cite news |last1=Vigna |first1=Paul |title=Bitcoin's 'One Percent' Controls Lion's Share of the Cryptocurrency's Wealth |work=] |date=20 December 2021 |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/bitcoins-one-percent-controls-lions-share-of-the-cryptocurrencys-wealth-11639996204 |issn=0099-9660 |url-access=subscription |access-date=22 December 2021 |archive-date=22 December 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211222180909/https://www.wsj.com/articles/bitcoins-one-percent-controls-lions-share-of-the-cryptocurrencys-wealth-11639996204 |url-status=live }}</ref> {{As of|2023|9}}, El Salvador had $76.5 million worth of bitcoin in its ].<ref>{{Cite news |last=Cota |first=Isabella |date=2 September 2023 |title=Two years of bitcoin in Bukele's El Salvador: An opaque experiment with a little-used currency |url=https://english.elpais.com/international/2023-09-02/two-years-of-bitcoin-in-bukeles-el-salvador-an-opaque-experiment-with-a-little-used-currency.html |website=] |language=en-us |access-date=24 November 2023 |archive-date=24 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231124082557/https://english.elpais.com/international/2023-09-02/two-years-of-bitcoin-in-bukeles-el-salvador-an-opaque-experiment-with-a-little-used-currency.html |url-status=live }}</ref>


In 2018, research published in the '']'' concluded that ] occurred during the ] bitcoin theft and that the market remained vulnerable to manipulation.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gandal |first1=Neil |last2=Hamrick |first2=J.T. |last3=Moore |first3=Tyler |last4=Oberman |first4=Tali |date=May 2018 |title=Price manipulation in the Bitcoin ecosystem |journal=] |volume=95 |pages=86–96 |doi=10.1016/j.jmoneco.2017.12.004 |s2cid=26358036 |doi-access=free}}</ref> Research published in '']'' also suggested that trading associated with increases in the amount of the ] and associated trading at the ] exchange accounted for about half of the price increase in bitcoin in late 2017.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Griffin |first1=John M. |last2=Shams |first2=Amin |date=August 2020 |title=Is Bitcoin Really Untethered? |url= |journal=] |language=en |volume=75 |issue=4 |pages=1913–1964 |doi=10.1111/jofi.12903 |doi-access=free|s2cid=229576274 |issn=0022-1082}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Popper |first=Nathaniel |date=13 June 2018 |title=Bitcoin's Price Was Artificially Inflated Last Year, Researchers Say |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/13/technology/bitcoin-price-manipulation.html |url-status=live |access-date=13 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180613100732/https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/13/technology/bitcoin-price-manipulation.html |archive-date=13 June 2018}}</ref>
=====Hacktivism=====
The hacking organization "]" accepted donations in Bitcoin, having said that the group "needs bitcoin donations to continue their hacking efforts".<ref name="CNET">{{cite web
|last= Reisinger
|first= Don
|url= http://news.cnet.com/8301-13506_3-20070268-17/senators-target-bitcoin-currency-citing-drug-sales/
|title= Senators target Bitcoin currency, citing drug sales &#124; The Digital Home – CNET News
|publisher= News.cnet.com
|date= 2011-06-09
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref><ref>{{cite news
|last= Olson
|first= Parmy
|url= http://blogs.forbes.com/parmyolson/2011/06/06/lulzsec-hackers-posts-sony-dev-source-code-get-7k-donation/
|title= LulzSec Hackers Post Sony Dev. Source Code, Get $7K Donation – Parmy Olson – Disruptors – Forbes
|publisher= Blogs.forbes.com
|date= 6 June 2011
|accessdate = 2011-06-22
}}</ref>
Following the banking blockade instituted against ] by mainstream payment processors such as ], ] and ], the website accepts donations in Bitcoin.<ref>http://shop.wikileaks.org/donate#dbitcoin</ref>


Bitcoin, along with other cryptocurrencies, has been described as an ] by several economists, including ] laureates, such as ],<ref name="Stiglitz">{{Cite news |last=Costelloe |first=Kevin |date=29 November 2017 |title=Bitcoin 'Ought to Be Outlawed,' Nobel Prize Winner Stiglitz Says |work=Bloomberg News |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-29/bitcoin-ought-to-be-outlawed-nobel-prize-winner-stiglitz-says-jal10hxd |url-status=live |access-date=5 June 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180612224313/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-29/bitcoin-ought-to-be-outlawed-nobel-prize-winner-stiglitz-says-jal10hxd |archive-date=12 June 2018 |quote=It doesn't serve any socially useful function. |url-access=subscription}}</ref> ],<ref name=4Nobels/> and ].<ref name=Krugman>{{Cite news |last=Mohamed |first=Theron |title=Nobel economist Paul Krugman slams crypto as mostly useless, after saying it's hugely overpriced and helps criminals |url=https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/currencies/paul-krugman-crypto-bitcoin-price-bubble-crime-cbdc-desantis-banks-2023-5 |date=30 May 2023 |website=] |language=en-US |access-date=23 November 2023 |archive-date=23 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231123131322/https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/currencies/paul-krugman-crypto-bitcoin-price-bubble-crime-cbdc-desantis-banks-2023-5 |url-status=live }}</ref> Another recipient of the prize, ], argues that bitcoin is rather a ] that may become an ]. He describes its price growth as an "epidemic", driven by ].<ref>{{Cite news |date=9 June 2021 |title=Don't Call Bitcoin a Bubble. It's an Epidemic |language=en |work=Bloomberg.com |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-06-09/don-t-call-bitcoin-a-bubble-it-s-an-epidemic |first=John |last=Authers|author-link=John Authers|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210610021335/https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2021-06-09/don-t-call-bitcoin-a-bubble-it-s-an-epidemic |archive-date=10 June 2021 |url-status=live |url-access=subscription}}</ref> In 2024, ], also Nobel laureate, described bitcoin as a "pure bubble" as its ] is zero. According to him, some bubbles are long-lasting such as gold and fiat currencies, and it's impossible to predict whether bitcoin will collapse like other financial bubbles or become the new gold.<ref>{{Cite news |date=2024-02-01 |title=Cryptocurrencies: an economist's view |url=https://www.tse-fr.eu/cryptocurrencies-economists-view |access-date=2024-11-15 |language=en | first1=Jean|last1=Tirole|author-link1=Jean Tirole|work=La Jaune et la Rouge|issue=792|volume=February 2024}}</ref> The same year, ] ] described bitcoin as a digital competitor to gold but not to the dollar as he argued it is a highly volatile ] asset not used as a form of payment.<ref>{{Cite news |author= |date= |title=Bitcoin breaks $100,000 barrier amid post-election cryptocurrency surge |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/12/04/bitcoin-price-100k-crypto-trump/ |access-date=5 December 2024 |newspaper=Washington Post |quote=“People use bitcoin as a speculative asset. It’s like gold, it’s just like gold, only it’s virtual, it’s digital. People are not using it as a form of payment or a store of value,” he said. “It’s highly volatile. It’s not a competitor for the dollar; it’s really a competitor for gold.”}}</ref>
=====Silk Road=====
] is an anonymous ] that uses only Bitcoin.<ref name="gawker-06-01-11"/><ref name="npr-06-12-11">
{{Cite news
|url= http://www.npr.org/2011/06/12/137138008/silk-road-not-your-fathers-amazon-com
|date= 12 June 2011
|newspaper= NPR
|title= Silk Road: Not Your Father's Amazon.com
|author= Staff
}}</ref> In a 2011 letter to Attorney General Eric Holder and the Drug Enforcement Administration, senators ] of New York and ] of West Virginia called for an investigation into Bitcoin and Silk Road.<ref name="npr-06-12-11"/> Schumer described the use of bitcoins at Silk Road as a form of ].<ref name="ars-06-08-11"/> Consequently ] of Intersango, a UK-based bitcoin exchange, put out a statement calling for regulation of Bitcoin exchanges by law enforcement.<ref name="britcoin reuters"> – Bitcoin exchanges offer anti- money-laundering aid</ref><ref name="britcoin statement"> – statement to reuters from bitomat.pl and Britcoin.co.uk</ref>


According to research published in the '']'' in 2018, bitcoin as an asset is highly volatile and does not behave like any other conventional asset.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Klein |first1=Tony |last2=Pham Thu |first2=Hien |last3=Walther |first3=Thomas |date=October 2018 |title=Bitcoin is not the New Gold – A comparison of volatility, correlation, and portfolio performance |url=https://pureadmin.qub.ac.uk/ws/files/155247201/crypto_V2.pdf |journal=International Review of Financial Analysis |language=en |volume=59 |pages=105–116 |doi=10.1016/j.irfa.2018.07.010 |s2cid=158400153 |doi-access= |access-date=24 November 2023 |archive-date=25 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231125164037/https://pureadmin.qub.ac.uk/ws/files/155247201/crypto_V2.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref> According to one 2022 analysis published in '']'', bitcoin was less volatile than ], ], ], and 190 stocks in the ] during and after the ].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Mazur |first=Mieszko |date=31 March 2022 |title=Misperceptions of Bitcoin Volatility |url= |journal=The Journal of Alternative Investments |language=en |volume=24 |issue=4 |pages=33–44 |doi=10.3905/jai.2022.1.153 |s2cid=247843794 |issn=1520-3255 |doi-access=}}</ref> The term {{wikt-lang|en|hodl}} was created in December 2013 for ] bitcoin rather than selling it during periods of volatility.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Montag |first1=Ali |title='HODL,' 'whale' and 5 other cryptocurrency slang terms explained |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/23/what-hodl-whale-and-other-cryptocurrency-slang-terms-mean.html |work=CNBC |date=26 August 2018 |access-date=16 March 2021 |archive-date=12 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220112091630/https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/23/what-hodl-whale-and-other-cryptocurrency-slang-terms-mean.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-19/what-the-heck-is-hodl-bitcoin-lingo-for-crypto-noobs-quicktake |title=All the Bitcoin Lingo You Need to Know as Crypto Heats Up |last=Hajric |first=Vildana |date=19 November 2020 |work=Bloomberg |access-date=1 December 2020 |url-access=subscription |archive-date=29 November 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201129234847/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-19/what-the-heck-is-hodl-bitcoin-lingo-for-crypto-noobs-quicktake |url-status=live }}</ref>
==Developer==
] designed the Bitcoin system<ref name="processors">{{Cite news
|last= Davis
|first= Joshua
|title= The Crypto-Currency
|url= http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/11/mf_bitcoin/all
|accessdate = 11 November 2011
|newspaper= ]
|date= 10 November 2011
}}</ref> and worked on the software in 2007.<ref name="code_start">{{cite web
|url= https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=13.msg46#msg46
|title= Questions about Bitcoin
|publisher= Bitcoin forum
|date= 2009-12-10
}}</ref>
In 2008, Nakamoto self-published a paper<ref name="whitepaper">{{cite web
|last= Nakamoto
|first= Satoshi
|title= Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System
|url= http://www.bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
|accessdate = 14 December 2010
|date= 24 May 2009
|postscript= <!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}
}}</ref><ref>{{cite web
|url= http://article.gmane.org/gmane.comp.encryption.general/12588/
|title= Bitcoin P2P e-cash paper
}}</ref> outlining his work on The Cryptography Mailing list at metzdowd.com<ref></ref> and then on 3 January 2009 released the open source project called Bitcoin and created the first block, called the "Genesis Block."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://blockexplorer.com/block/000000000019d6689c085ae165831e934ff763ae46a2a6c172b3f1b60a8ce26f|title=Block 0 – Bitcoin Block Explorer|work=The Genesis Block}}</ref> Many people other than Nakamoto contributed to the development of the Bitcoin software.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://bitcoin.org/about.html|title=About Bitcoin}}</ref> The name "Satoshi Nakamoto" is believed to be a pseudonym.{{citation needed|date=May 2012}}
<!--
The philosophical underpinnings of Bitcoin come from a distrust of government-controlled central banks. "The root problem with conventional currency is all the trust that's required to make it work," Nakamoto wrote. "The central bank must be trusted not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat currencies is full of breaches of that trust. Banks must be trusted to hold our money and transfer it electronically, but they lend it out in waves of credit bubbles with barely a fraction in reserve."<ref name="processors" />-->


Other economists, investors, and the ] have described bitcoin as a potential ].<ref>{{cite news |last=Clinch |first=Matt |date=10 March 2014 |title=Roubini launches stinging attack on bitcoin |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2014/03/10/nches-stinging-attack-on-bitcoin.html |publisher=] |access-date=22 November 2023 |archive-date=9 July 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220709232801/https://www.cnbc.com/2014/03/10/nches-stinging-attack-on-bitcoin.html |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |title=This Billionaire Just Called Bitcoin a 'Pyramid Scheme' |work=]|url=https://fortune.com/2017/07/27/howard-marks-bitcoin-pyramid-scheme |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170924045918/http://fortune.com/2017/07/27/howard-marks-bitcoin-pyramid-scheme/ |archive-date=24 September 2017 |access-date=23 September 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Ott Ummelas |last2=Milda Seputyte |date=31 January 2014 |title=Bitcoin 'Ponzi' Concern Sparks Warning From Estonia Bank |work=Bloomberg News |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-30/bitcoin-ponzi-scheme-worry-sparks-estonia-central-bank-caution.html |url-status=live |access-date=1 April 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140329214501/http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-30/bitcoin-ponzi-scheme-worry-sparks-estonia-central-bank-caution.html |archive-date=29 March 2014 |url-access=subscription}}</ref> Legal scholar ] disagrees, however, as "a real Ponzi scheme takes fraud; bitcoin, by contrast, seems more like a collective ]".<ref>{{Cite news |last=Posner |first=Eric |author-link=Eric Posner |date=11 April 2013 |title=Fool's Gold |language=en-US |work=Slate |url=https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2013/04/bitcoin-is-a-ponzi-scheme-the-internet-currency-will-collapse.html |access-date=22 November 2023 |issn=1091-2339 |archive-date=8 July 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220708202651/https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2013/04/bitcoin-is-a-ponzi-scheme-the-internet-currency-will-collapse.html |url-status=live }}</ref> A 2014 ] report also concluded that bitcoin was not a deliberate Ponzi scheme.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Davradakis |first1=Emmanouil |last2=Santos |first2=Ricardo |url=https://data.europa.eu/doi/10.2867/11329 |title=Blockchain, FinTechs and their relevance for international financial institutions |date=2019 |publisher=] |doi=10.2867/11329 |isbn=978-92-861-4184-3 |access-date=24 November 2023 |archive-date=21 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240421113801/https://op.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/-/publication/ae472145-237a-11e9-8d04-01aa75ed71a1/language-en |url-status=live }}</ref>
==See also==
{{Portal|Business and economics|Free software|Numismatics}}
{{Div col}}
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
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==See also==
'''Digital money systems:'''
* ] * ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
* ]
{{Div col end}}


==Notes== ==Notes==
{{Notelist}}
{{Reflist|group="Notes"}}


==References== ==References==
{{Reflist|30em}} {{Reflist}}


==External links== ==Further reading==
*{{cite web|last=Nakamoto|first=Satoshi|date=31 October 2008|title=Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System|url=https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140320135003/https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf|archive-date=20 March 2014|access-date=28 April 2014|publisher=bitcoin.org}}
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| PLEASE BE CAUTIOUS IN ADDING MORE LINKS TO THIS ARTICLE. Misplaced Pages |
| is not a collection of links nor should it be used for advertising. |
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| See ] & ] for details. |
| |
| Please propose additions or |
| replacements on this article's discussion page, or submit your link |
| to the relevant category at the Open Directory Project (dmoz.org) |
| and link back to that category using the {{dmoz}} template. |
======================= {{No more links}} =============================-->
{{commons category|Bitcoin}}
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*{{dmoz|Science/Social_Sciences/Economics/Financial_Economics/Currency_and_Money/Alternative_Monetary_Systems/Bitcoin/|Bitcoin}}
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{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2011}}


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Latest revision as of 17:36, 5 January 2025

Decentralized digital currency For the colloquial expression for coinage, see Bit (money). "₿" redirects here. Not to be confused with "฿" for Thai baht.

Bitcoin
Prevailing bitcoin logoOfficial logo from bitcoin.org
Denominations
PluralBitcoins
Symbol
(Unicode: U+20BF ₿ BITCOIN SIGN)
CodeBTC
Precision10
Subunits
 1⁄1000Millibitcoin
 1⁄1000000Microbitcoin
 1⁄100000000Satoshi
Development
Original author(s)Satoshi Nakamoto
White paper"Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System"
Implementation(s)Bitcoin Core
Initial release0.1.0 / 9 January 2009 (15 years ago) (2009-01-09)
Latest release28.0 / 4 October 2024 (3 months ago) (2024-10-04)
Code repositorygithub.com/bitcoin/bitcoin
Development statusActive
Written inC++
Source modelFree and open-source software
LicenseMIT License
Ledger
Ledger start3 January 2009 (16 years ago) (2009-01-03)
Timestamping schemeProof of work (partial hash inversion)
Hash functionSHA-256 (two rounds)
Issuance scheduleDecentralized (block reward)
Initially ₿50 per block, halved every 210,000 blocks
Block reward₿3.125 (as of 2024)
Block time10 minutes
Circulating supply₿19,591,231 (as of 6 January 2024)
Supply limit₿21,000,000
Valuation
Exchange rateFloating
Demographics
Official user(s)El Salvador
Website
Websitebitcoin.org
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Bitcoin (abbreviation: BTC; sign: ) is the first decentralized cryptocurrency. Based on a free-market ideology, bitcoin was invented in 2008 by Satoshi Nakamoto, an unknown person. Use of bitcoin as a currency began in 2009, with the release of its open-source implementation. In 2021, El Salvador adopted it as legal tender. It is mostly seen as an investment and has been described by some scholars as an economic bubble. As bitcoin is pseudonymous, its use by criminals has attracted the attention of regulators, leading to its ban by several countries as of 2021.

Nodes in the peer-to-peer bitcoin network verify transactions through cryptography and record them in a public distributed ledger, called a blockchain, without central oversight. Consensus between nodes is achieved using a computationally intensive process based on proof of work, called mining, that secures the bitcoin blockchain. Mining consumes large quantities of electricity and has been criticized for its environmental impact.

History

Main article: History of bitcoin

Background

Before bitcoin, several digital cash technologies were released, starting with David Chaum's ecash in the 1980s. The idea that solutions to computational puzzles could have some value was first proposed by cryptographers Cynthia Dwork and Moni Naor in 1992. The concept was independently rediscovered by Adam Back who developed Hashcash, a proof-of-work scheme for spam control in 1997. The first proposals for distributed digital scarcity-based cryptocurrencies came from cypherpunks Wei Dai (b-money) and Nick Szabo (bit gold) in 1998. In 2004, Hal Finney developed the first currency based on reusable proof of work. These various attempts were not successful: Chaum's concept required centralized control and no banks wanted to sign on, Hashcash had no protection against double-spending, while b-money and bit gold were not resistant to Sybil attacks.

2008–2009: Creation

External image
image icon Cover page of The Times 3 January 2009 showing the headline used in the genesis block
Bitcoin logos made by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009 (left) and 2010 (right).

The domain name bitcoin.org was registered on 18 August 2008. On 31 October 2008, a link to a white paper authored by Satoshi Nakamoto titled Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System was posted to a cryptography mailing list. Nakamoto implemented the bitcoin software as open-source code and released it in January 2009. Nakamoto's identity remains unknown. According to computer scientist Arvind Narayanan, all individual components of bitcoin originated in earlier academic literature. Nakamoto's innovation was their complex interplay resulting in the first decentralized, Sybil resistant, Byzantine fault tolerant digital cash system, that would eventually be referred to as the first blockchain. Nakamoto's paper was not peer reviewed and was initially ignored by academics, who argued that it could not work.

On 3 January 2009, the bitcoin network was created when Nakamoto mined the starting block of the chain, known as the genesis block. Embedded in this block was the text "The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks", which is the date and headline of an issue of The Times newspaper. Nine days later, Hal Finney received the first bitcoin transaction: ten bitcoins from Nakamoto. Wei Dai and Nick Szabo were also early supporters. On May 22, 2010, the first known commercial transaction using bitcoin occurred when programmer Laszlo Hanyecz bought two Papa John's pizzas for ₿10,000, in what would later be celebrated as "Bitcoin Pizza Day".

2010–2012: Early growth

Blockchain analysts estimate that Nakamoto had mined about one million bitcoins before disappearing in 2010 when he handed the network alert key and control of the code repository over to Gavin Andresen. Andresen later became lead developer at the Bitcoin Foundation, an organization founded in September 2012 to promote bitcoin.

After early "proof-of-concept" transactions, the first major users of bitcoin were black markets, such as the dark web Silk Road. During its 30 months of existence, beginning in February 2011, Silk Road exclusively accepted bitcoins as payment, transacting ₿9.9 million, worth about $214 million.

2013–2014: First regulatory actions

In March 2013, the US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) established regulatory guidelines for "decentralized virtual currencies" such as bitcoin, classifying American bitcoin miners who sell their generated bitcoins as money services businesses, subject to registration and other legal obligations. In May 2013, US authorities seized the unregistered exchange Mt. Gox. In June 2013, the US Drug Enforcement Administration seized ₿11.02 from a man attempting to use them to buy illegal substances. This marked the first time a government agency had seized bitcoins. The FBI seized about ₿30,000 in October 2013 from Silk Road, following the arrest of its founder Ross Ulbricht.

In December 2013, the People's Bank of China prohibited Chinese financial institutions from using bitcoin. After the announcement, the value of bitcoin dropped, and Baidu no longer accepted bitcoins for certain services. Buying real-world goods with any virtual currency had been illegal in China since at least 2009.

2015–2019

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. In August 2017, the SegWit software upgrade was activated. Segwit was intended to support the Lightning Network as well as improve scalability. SegWit opponents, who supported larger blocks as a scalability solution, forked to create Bitcoin Cash, one of many forks of bitcoin.

In December 2017, the first futures on bitcoin was introduced by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME).

In February 2018, the price crashed after China imposed a complete ban on bitcoin trading. The percentage of bitcoin trading in the Chinese renminbi fell from over 90% in September 2017 to less than 1% in June 2018. During the same year, bitcoin prices were negatively affected by several hacks or thefts from cryptocurrency exchanges.

2020–present

Bitcoin price December 1, 2014 -
December 4, 2024

In 2020, some major companies and institutions started to acquire bitcoin: MicroStrategy invested $250 million in bitcoin as a treasury reserve asset, Square, Inc., $50 million, and MassMutual, $100 million. In November 2020, PayPal added support for bitcoin in the US.

In February 2021, bitcoin's market capitalization reached $1 trillion for the first time. In November 2021, the Taproot soft-fork upgrade was activated, adding support for Schnorr signatures, improved functionality of smart contracts and Lightning Network. Before, bitcoin only used a custom elliptic curve with the ECDSA algorithm to produce signatures. In September 2021, bitcoin became legal tender in El Salvador, alongside the US dollar. In October 2021, the first bitcoin futures exchange-traded fund (ETF), called BITO, from ProShares was approved by the SEC and listed on the CME.

In May and June 2022, the bitcoin price fell following the collapses of TerraUSD, a stablecoin, and the Celsius Network, a cryptocurrency loan company.

In 2023, ordinals—non-fungible tokens (NFTs)—on bitcoin, went live. As of June 2023, River Financial estimated that bitcoin had 81.7 million users, about 1% of the global population. In January 2024, the first 11 US spot bitcoin ETFs began trading, offering direct exposure to bitcoin for the first time on American stock exchanges. In December 2024, bitcoin price reached $100,000 for the first time, as US president-elect Donald Trump promised to make the US the "crypto capital of the planet" and to stockpile bitcoin. The same month, BlackRock, the world's largest asset manager, recommended investors to allocate up to 2% of their portfolio to bitcoin.

Design

Main article: Bitcoin protocol

Units and divisibility

The unit of account of the bitcoin system is the bitcoin. It is most commonly represented with the symbol ₿ and the currency code BTC. However, the BTC code does not conform to ISO 4217 as BT is the country code of Bhutan, and ISO 4217 requires the first letter used in global commodities to be 'X'. XBT, a code that conforms to ISO 4217 though not officially part of it, is used by Bloomberg L.P.

No uniform capitalization convention exists; some sources use Bitcoin, capitalized, to refer to the technology and network, and bitcoin, lowercase, for the unit of account. The Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary and the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary use the capitalized and lowercase variants without distinction.

One bitcoin is divisible to eight decimal places. Units for smaller amounts of bitcoin are the millibitcoin (mBTC), equal to 1⁄1000 bitcoin, and the satoshi (sat), representing 1⁄100000000 (one hundred millionth) bitcoin, the smallest amount possible. 100,000 satoshis are one mBTC.

Blockchain

Further information: Blockchain § Structure and design

As a decentralized system, bitcoin operates without a central authority or single administrator, so that anyone can create a new bitcoin address and transact without needing any approval. This is accomplished through a specialized distributed ledger called a blockchain that records bitcoin transactions.

The blockchain is implemented as an ordered list of blocks. Each block contains a SHA-256 hash of the previous block, chaining them in chronological order. The blockchain is maintained by a peer-to-peer network. Individual blocks, public addresses, and transactions within blocks are public information, and can be examined using a blockchain explorer.

Nodes validate and broadcast transactions, each maintaining a copy of the blockchain for ownership verification. A new block is created every 10 minutes on average, updating the blockchain across all nodes without central oversight. This process tracks bitcoin spending, ensuring each bitcoin is spent only once. Unlike a traditional ledger that tracks physical currency, bitcoins exist digitally as unspent outputs of transactions.

Addresses and transactions

Simplified chain of ownership. In practice, a transaction can have more than one input and more than one output.

In the blockchain, bitcoins are linked to specific addresses that are hashes of a public key. Creating an address involves generating a random private key and then computing the corresponding address. This process is almost instant, but the reverse (finding the private key for a given address) is nearly impossible. Publishing a bitcoin address does not risk its private key, and it is extremely unlikely to accidentally generate a used key with funds. To use bitcoins, owners need their private key to digitally sign transactions, which are verified by the network using the public key, keeping the private key secret.

Bitcoin transactions use a Forth-like scripting language, involving one or more inputs and outputs. When sending bitcoins, a user specifies the recipients' addresses and the amount for each output. This allows sending bitcoins to several recipients in a single transaction. To prevent double-spending, each input must refer to a previous unspent output in the blockchain. Using multiple inputs is similar to using multiple coins in a cash transaction. As in a cash transaction, the sum of inputs can exceed the intended sum of payments. In such a case, an additional output can return the change back to the payer. Unallocated input satoshis in the transaction become the transaction fee.

Losing a private key means losing access to the bitcoins, with no other proof of ownership accepted by the protocol. For instance, in 2013, a user lost ₿7,500, valued at US$7.5 million, by accidentally discarding a hard drive with the private key. It is estimated that around 20% of all bitcoins are lost. The private key must also be kept secret as its exposure, such as through a data breach, can lead to theft of the associated bitcoins. As of December 2017, approximately ₿980,000 had been stolen from cryptocurrency exchanges.

Mining

See also: Bitcoin protocol § Mining
Bitcoin mining facility with large amounts of mining hardware

The mining process in bitcoin involves maintaining the blockchain through computer processing power. Miners group and broadcast new transactions into blocks, which are then verified by the network. Each block must contain a proof of work (PoW) to be accepted, involving finding a nonce number that, combined with the block content, produces a hash numerically smaller than the network's difficulty target. This PoW is simple to verify but hard to generate, requiring many attempts. PoW forms the basis of bitcoin's consensus mechanism.

The difficulty of generating a block is deterministically adjusted based on the mining power on the network by changing the difficulty target, which is recalibrated every 2,016 blocks (approximately two weeks) to maintain an average time of ten minutes between new blocks. The process requires significant computational power and specialized hardware.

Miners who successfully find a new block can collect transaction fees from the included transactions and a set reward in bitcoins. To claim this reward, a special transaction called a coinbase is included in the block, with the miner as the payee. All bitcoins in existence have been created through this type of transaction. This reward is halved every 210,000 blocks until ₿21 million, with new bitcoin issuance slated to end around 2140. Afterward, miners will only earn from transaction fees. These fees are determined by the transaction's size and the amount of data stored, measured in satoshis per byte.

The proof of work system and the chaining of blocks make blockchain modifications very difficult, as altering one block requires changing all subsequent blocks. As more blocks are added, modifying older blocks becomes increasingly challenging. In case of disagreement, nodes trust the longest chain, which required the greatest amount of effort to produce. To tamper or censor the ledger, one needs to control the majority of the global hashrate. The high cost required to reach this level of computational power secures the bitcoin blockchain.

Bitcoin mining's environmental impact is controversial and has attracted the attention of regulators, leading to restrictions or incentives in various jurisdictions. As of 2022, a non-peer-reviewed study by the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance (CCAF) estimated that bitcoin mining represented 0.4% of global electricity consumption. Another 2022 non-peer-reviewed commentary published in Joule estimated that bitcoin mining was responsible for 0.2% of world greenhouse gas emissions. About half of the electricity used is generated through fossil fuels. Moreover, mining hardware's short lifespan results in electronic waste. The amount of electrical energy consumed, and the e-waste generated, is comparable to that of Greece and the Netherlands, respectively.

Privacy and fungibility

Bitcoin is pseudonymous, with funds linked to addresses, not real-world identities. While the owners of these addresses are not directly identified, all transactions are public on the blockchain. Patterns of use, like spending coins from multiple inputs, can hint at a common owner. Public data can sometimes be matched with known address owners. Bitcoin exchanges might also need to collect personal data as per legal requirements. For enhanced privacy, users can generate a new address for each transaction.

In the bitcoin network, each bitcoin is treated equally, ensuring basic fungibility. However, users and applications can choose to differentiate between bitcoins. While wallets and software treat all bitcoins the same, each bitcoin's transaction history is recorded on the blockchain. This public record allows for chain analysis, where users can identify and potentially reject bitcoins from controversial sources. For example, in 2012, Mt. Gox froze accounts containing bitcoins identified as stolen.

Wallets

For broader coverage of this topic, see Cryptocurrency wallet. Screenshot of Bitcoin CoreA paper wallet with the address as a QR code while the private key is hiddenA hardware wallet which processes bitcoin transactions without exposing private keys

Bitcoin wallets were the first cryptocurrency wallets, enabling users to store the information necessary to transact bitcoins. The first wallet program, simply named Bitcoin, and sometimes referred to as the Satoshi client, was released in 2009 by Nakamoto as open-source software. Bitcoin Core is among the best known clients. Forks of Bitcoin Core exist such as Bitcoin Unlimited. Wallets can be full clients, with a full copy of the blockchain to check the validity of mined blocks, or lightweight clients, just to send and receive transactions without a local copy of the entire blockchain. Third-party internet services called online wallets store users' credentials on their servers, making them susceptible of hacks. Cold storage protects bitcoins from such hacks by keeping private keys offline, either through specialized hardware wallets or paper printouts.

Scalability and decentralization challenges

Nakamoto limited the block size to one megabyte. The limited block size and frequency can lead to delayed processing of transactions, increased fees and a bitcoin scalability problem. The Lightning Network, second-layer routing network, is a potential scaling solution.

Research shows a trend towards centralization in bitcoin as miners join pools for stable income. If a single miner or pool controls more than 50% of the hashing power, it would allow them to censor transactions and double-spend coins. In 2014, mining pool Ghash.io reached 51% mining power, causing safety concerns, but later voluntarily capped its power at 39.99% for the benefit of the whole network. A few entities also dominate other parts of the ecosystem such as the client software, online wallets, and simplified payment verification (SPV) clients.

Economics and usage

Main article: Economics of bitcoin

Bitcoin's theoretical roots and ideology

According to the European Central Bank, the decentralization of money offered by bitcoin has its theoretical roots in the Austrian school of economics, especially with Friedrich Hayek's The Denationalisation of Money, in which he advocates a complete free market in the production, distribution and management of money to end the monopoly of central banks. Sociologist Nigel Dodd argues that the essence of the bitcoin ideology is to remove money from social, as well as governmental, control. The Economist describes bitcoin as "a techno-anarchist project to create an online version of cash, a way for people to transact without the possibility of interference from malicious governments or banks". These philosophical ideas initially attracted libertarians and anarchists. Economist Paul Krugman argues that cryptocurrencies like bitcoin are only used by bank skeptics and criminals.

Recognition as a currency and legal status

Legal status of bitcoin   Legal tender (bitcoin is officially recognized as a medium of exchange)   Permissive (legal to use bitcoin, with minimal or no restrictions)   Restricted (some legal restrictions on the usage of bitcoin)   Contentious (interpretation of old laws, but bitcoin is not directly prohibited)   Prohibited (full or partial prohibition on the use of bitcoin)   No data (no information available)

Money serves three purposes: a store of value, a medium of exchange, and a unit of account. According to The Economist in 2014, bitcoin functions best as a medium of exchange. In 2015, The Economist noted that bitcoins had three qualities useful in a currency: they are "hard to earn, limited in supply and easy to verify". However, a 2018 assessment by The Economist stated that cryptocurrencies met none of these three criteria. Per some researchers, as of 2015, bitcoin functions more as a payment system than as a currency. In 2014, economist Robert J. Shiller wrote that bitcoin has potential as a unit of account for measuring the relative value of goods, as with Chile's Unidad de Fomento, but that "Bitcoin in its present form... doesn't really solve any sensible economic problem". François R. Velde, Senior Economist at the Chicago Fed, described bitcoin as "an elegant solution to the problem of creating a digital currency". David Andolfatto, Vice President at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, stated that bitcoin is a threat to the establishment, which he argues is a good thing for the Federal Reserve System and other central banks, because it prompts these institutions to operate sound policies.

The legal status of bitcoin varies substantially from one jurisdiction to another. Because of its decentralized nature and its global presence, regulating bitcoin is difficult. However, the use of bitcoin can be criminalized, and shutting down exchanges and the peer-to-peer economy in a given country would constitute a de facto ban. The use of bitcoin by criminals has attracted the attention of financial regulators, legislative bodies, and law enforcement. Nobel-prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz says that bitcoin's anonymity encourages money laundering and other crimes. This is the main justification behind bitcoin bans. As of November 2021, nine countries applied an absolute ban (Algeria, Bangladesh, China, Egypt, Iraq, Morocco, Nepal, Qatar, and Tunisia) while another 42 countries had an implicit ban. Bitcoin is only legal tender in El Salvador.

Use for payments

Café in Delft accepting Bitcoin

As of 2018, bitcoin is rarely used in transactions with merchants, but it is popular to purchase illegal goods online. Prices are not usually quoted in bitcoin and trades involve conversions into fiat currencies. Commonly cited reasons for not using bitcoin include high costs, the inability to process chargebacks, high price volatility, long transaction times, and transaction fees (especially for small purchases). Bloomberg reported that bitcoin was being used for large-item purchases on the site Overstock.com and for cross-border payments to freelancers. As of 2015, there was little sign of bitcoin use in international remittances despite high fees charged by banks and Western Union who compete in this market. Despite associated risks and costs, in 2022, a growing use of bitcoin, alongside cash and cards, was reported in restaurant business.

In September 2021, the Bitcoin Law made bitcoin legal tender in El Salvador, alongside the US dollar. The adoption has been criticized internationally and within El Salvador. In 2022, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) urged El Salvador to reverse its decision. As of 2022, the use of Bitcoin in El Salvador remains low: 80% of businesses refused to accept it. In April 2022, the Central African Republic (CAR) adopted bitcoin as legal tender alongside the CFA franc, but repealed the reform one year later.

Bitcoin is also used by some governments. For instance, the Iranian government initially opposed cryptocurrencies, but later saw them as an opportunity to circumvent sanctions. Since 2020, Iran has required local bitcoin miners to sell bitcoin to the Central Bank of Iran, allowing the central bank to use it for imports. Some constituent states also accept tax payments in bitcoin, including Colorado (US) and Zug (Switzerland). As of 2023, the US government owned more than $5 billion worth of seized bitcoin.

Use for investment and status as an economic bubble

Further information: Cryptocurrency bubble
Government website with El Salvador reserves

As of 2018, the overwhelming majority of bitcoin transactions took place on cryptocurrency exchanges. Since 2014, regulated bitcoin funds also allow exposure to the asset or to futures as an investment. Bitcoin is used as a store of value: individuals and companies such as the Winklevoss twins and Elon Musk's companies SpaceX and Tesla have massively invested in bitcoin. Bitcoin wealth is highly concentrated, with 0.01% holding 27% of in-circulation currency, as of 2021. As of September 2023, El Salvador had $76.5 million worth of bitcoin in its international reserves.

In 2018, research published in the Journal of Monetary Economics concluded that price manipulation occurred during the Mt. Gox bitcoin theft and that the market remained vulnerable to manipulation. Research published in The Journal of Finance also suggested that trading associated with increases in the amount of the Tether cryptocurrency and associated trading at the Bitfinex exchange accounted for about half of the price increase in bitcoin in late 2017.

Bitcoin, along with other cryptocurrencies, has been described as an economic bubble by several economists, including Nobel Prize in Economics laureates, such as Joseph Stiglitz, James Heckman, and Paul Krugman. Another recipient of the prize, Robert Shiller, argues that bitcoin is rather a fad that may become an asset class. He describes its price growth as an "epidemic", driven by contagious narratives. In 2024, Jean Tirole, also Nobel laureate, described bitcoin as a "pure bubble" as its intrinsic value is zero. According to him, some bubbles are long-lasting such as gold and fiat currencies, and it's impossible to predict whether bitcoin will collapse like other financial bubbles or become the new gold. The same year, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell described bitcoin as a digital competitor to gold but not to the dollar as he argued it is a highly volatile speculative asset not used as a form of payment.

According to research published in the International Review of Financial Analysis in 2018, bitcoin as an asset is highly volatile and does not behave like any other conventional asset. According to one 2022 analysis published in The Journal of Alternative Investments, bitcoin was less volatile than oil, silver, US Treasuries, and 190 stocks in the S&P 500 during and after the 2020 stock market crash. The term hodl was created in December 2013 for holding bitcoin rather than selling it during periods of volatility.

Other economists, investors, and the central bank of Estonia have described bitcoin as a potential Ponzi scheme. Legal scholar Eric Posner disagrees, however, as "a real Ponzi scheme takes fraud; bitcoin, by contrast, seems more like a collective delusion". A 2014 World Bank report also concluded that bitcoin was not a deliberate Ponzi scheme.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Named after Satoshi Nakamoto
  2. ^ The exact number is ₿20,999,999.9769.

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