The year 2020 has been a rollercoaster ride due to COVID-19 for every single one of us. Since most of us have been working from home, we’ve got the time to invest in things that we thought about - one such being learning about cryptocurrency and investing in it! Just investing your money in something that is in the headline isn’t enough, it is also of importance to learn and understand the subject that you are or going to invest your hard-earned money at.

Learning and understanding cryptocurrency will not only help you to have a piece of in-depth knowledge or insight but it will also help you to determine its pattern for you to prepare and analyze better in the future.

The first cryptocurrency that was introduced in the crypto-space was bitcoin in the year 2009 while there are over 5000 cryptocurrencies in the market now. Cryptocurrency has gained both - the praises and the criticism but the thing to notice is that it still grabs people’s attention and it is progressively growing in the space.

Also Read, COVID-19 - Its Impact On Bitcoin And Its Update

We are going to dedicate this blog to cryptocurrency - its decade, its journey!

2009

Bitcoin was introduced - a peer-to-peer electronic cash system by Satoshi Nakamoto while also blockchain technology came into the picture.

2010

Bitcoin was the first cryptocurrency - a decentralized digital currency and due to its underlying technology - blockchain technology - it cannot be tampered or be manipulated by anyone, not even the government or a bank. Even though it was introduced in 2009, it had a breakthrough in the year 2010 when it was used to purchase in the real-world - a pizza! Someone sold their BTC for the first time by swapping with 10,000 BTC for 2 pizzas which would have now been worth more than $100 million. And that led people to realize that it also had a tangible value and could be used for transactions.

2011

Bitcoin was still new in the market - it had slow progress but there was progress - and that was then the year 2011 introduced other forms of cryptocurrencies which is also known as altcoins. So basically, altcoins are all the cryptocurrencies other than bitcoin - however, the other cryptos were improvised than the previous. 

In June 2011, the bitcoin hit $31 but later dropped, Mt. Gox - a Japanese based exchange experienced a hack that prompted the transfer of bitcoins into cold storage from the online exchange.

Also, WikiLeaks started accepting Bitcoin donations.

2012

The cryptocurrency space in the year 2012 had steady growth and was receiving popularity however it also faced Ponzi schemes and scams. It led to a threat for the investors over the security of cryptocurrency.

In the same year, Coinbase - a cryptocurrency exchange was founded that made the purchase of crypto efficient, simple, and convenient for the investors.

2013

In the mid of the year 2013, the value of the Bitcoin crossed $200 and received media coverage and attention while the sudden hike in the price resulted in many people selling their Bitcoins and that led to an overnight price drop of 71%. However, if that were not enough, it culminated in late 2013 with a hit of $1150 and eventually, it dropped to 50%.

Bitcoin had tremendous ups and downs but interestingly it surpassed the price of the gold in November.

Ripple’s XRP - based on Bitcoin’s blockchain technology was launched as an asset for settlement with international transactions.

2014

In 2014, the price of the Bitcoin hit flashed due to the breach in the security at Mt. Gox that resulted in theft for the owners of over 850,000 coins.

Also in the same year, Michael Ou founded CoolBitX - its premier hardware wallet and enabling its users to transfer funds securely from exchanges to their hardware wallets.

2015

Ethereum was developed by Vitalik Buterin and had a crowd sale in the year 2014 which was introduced as a new blockchain technology platform. Ethereum was not only an alternative to fiat currency but its platform also provided Decentralized applications (DApps) and smart contracts along with ICO.

The other highlights were Tether - a stablecoin and the first generation CoolWallet crowdfunding campaign that was launched on Indiegogo.

2016

A hardfork was introduced to Ethereum due to the incident of the DAO in which $50 million was stolen during the ICO because of the loophole in security leading to exploitation. Hardfork’s purpose was to roll back the date of the platform to reverse the hack however many felt that it went against the crypto community’s ideal as the rollback was a lot like the government bailout and led to the creation of Ethereum Classic and the new - Ethereum.

Uber in Argentina initiated accepting payments in Bitcoins.

Also Read, Is Blockchain And Cryptocurrency The Same?

2017

In 2017, Microsoft and Starbucks started accepting payment in Bitcoin, also ICO learned a boost in the activities that led to Bitcoin surpassing the mark of $3000. While this news, eventually attracted the Wall Street analysts to follow crypto. Also in 2017, Bitcoin’s price crossed $10000 and by December it reached an ATH of $19,783 however in days it fell to over 45%.

While in the altcoin market, the XRP broke around Christmas the mark of $1 to $3.20 in two weeks and reached an increase in value by 36,000% by the end of the year.

2018

In 2018, Bitcoin and the altcoin market faced retraction while the market was reeling from the ICO and various projects exit scam, and over $800 million was lost by many exchange platforms due to hacking.

Lightning Network was introduced to make the transactions of Bitcoin faster and cheaper. Even though the year 2018 was less volatile however it stayed above $6000 and several Bitcoin ETF proposals were submitted to the SEC.

2019

In the initial period of 2019, cryptocurrency experienced significant positive growth in the market. Bitcoin surpassed 400 million transactions while Ethereum’s daily transactions surpass one million.

Facebook’s Libra project was announced in June while Bitcoin ran a bull of over $13,000.

2020

2020 has been an unpredictable market and everything that was expected is unclear and has changed due to pandemic.

However, the past is the past, and the only thing we can do is to learn from our past and avoid it in the future. In all the cases throughout cryptocurrency’s journey, security has been at stake and needs to be taken care of. Crypto exchanges can be a risky place to store and to avoid it is recommended to transfer into a hardware wallet. After all this, it is of utmost importance to stay diligent and keep yourself updated.