Cryptocurrency list: Back in the 80’s and early 90’s when the internet was still gaining its foot among the masses, only a few realized that how big it really was. The internet has now grown to become one of the most important parts of everyone’s life. This growth of the internet has triggered the growth of digitization of everything. Money and currency have also seen a great impact of the digitization. People are looking to find out a digital currency that would be universal to be transacted anywhere in the world without any restrictions. This is where cryptocurrencies come into the scene. You must now be thinking what’s a cryptocurrency? Well, worry not. Here’s all that you need to know about the cryptocurrencies and their types. The article that follows will explain you about the cryptocurrencies, and will also provide a top cryptocurrency list that you can invest in.
What is a cryptocurrency?
Cryptocurrencies are basically a digital form of money or currency designed to work as a medium of exchange. The name cryptocurrency is derived from the word cryptography, a process of converting information into an unbreakable code. This ensures that all the transactions are safe, secure, and most importantly hacker proof. It’s very important as there are no bodies that control these digital currencies like we see with the currencies that we use now.
All the transactions of these digital currencies are carried out through a series of Blockchain techniques that ensure that all the information of the transactions remains safe. These transactions are needed to be authenticated by both the sender and the receiver through a key that’s common for both of them. Additionally, the transactions are only accepted by the miners authenticate them by solving a cryptographic puzzle, which is generally a code. All these make the transactions of the digital currencies very secure and almost impossible to be hacked.
Cryptocurrency list: A list of all the top digital currencies present today
Bitcoin
This is probably the first ever cryptocurrency to come into existence. It introduced the people, a decentralized digital currency that was built on a peer-to-peer network and operated on the Blockchain technology. This famous brand of digital currency was invented and released as an open-source by Satoshi Nakamodo in the year 2009.
Bitcoin, which started with a small idea is now everywhere. People from all across the world are aware of what it is and even want to own the digital currency. 1 Bitcoin is priced at Rs. 9,02,335 or $14,188 as we write. Yes, don’t be shocked by seeing the cost of a single Bitcoin. In fact, the value of Bitcoin has grown more than a staggering 750%, which is insane.
You might think that because of it’s high-cost, Bitcoin might not be that popular among people, which is completely not the case. In fact, despite its huge price cap, it’s the most actively used cryptocurrency present today. There are reports that state that more than 300,000 Bitcoin transactions happen every day, which is a great figure.
Since the number of Bitcoins is limited, it’s expected that the cost of this digital currency will grow even more than what it is today. This is what makes Bitcoin the king of the cryptocurrencies and the first name in out top cryptocurrency list.
Ethereum
After the Bitcoins, Ethereum is probably the second most used cryptocurrency that the people use. Like Bitcoin, it also operates on the reliable blockchain technology. However, it’s more than just a digital currency. It’s, in fact, a decentralized software platform that enables Distributed Applications (ĐApps) and Smart Contracts to be built and run without any fraud, downtime, interference or control from a third party. This means it can not only facilitate the exchange of money, but it can also facilitate the exchange of content, shares, property, or anything of value.
Ethereum is world’s first blockchain supercomputer that’s fuelled by a digital currency called Ether. It’s used generally by developers to pay for transaction fees and pay for the services on the Ethereum network. As we write this article, 1 Ethereum costs about $1364.50 or Rs. 86,780. Given the rate at which Ethereum is growing in terms and cost and popularity, it’s not far from reaching near Bitcoin.
Ripple
This digital currency is very different from the others that are present today. While the other cryptocurrencies present today cater to individuals, Ripple is basically aimed at payment providers, banks, and even digital asset exchanges. Not only this, there are many other features that make Ripple different from other cryptocurrencies. Like other cryptocurrencies, Ripple doesn’t have an intrinsic value of its own. Instead, it acts as a token of protecting RippleNet against the spams.
Ripple is basically a real-time global settlement network that offers instant, cross-border, fail-safe payments with minimum costs and maximum transparency. It uses an agreement ledger as its method of confirmation, unlike other cryptocurrencies that require mining for tokens. This means you don’t need those computers with specific hardware specifications to mine the digital currency. As we write, the value of 1 Ripple in the market is $1.93 or Rs. 122.75.
Litecoin
Launched in 2011, Litecoin is also referred as the “silver to Bitcoin’s gold”. It was launched as an alternative to Bitcoin, which unlike now had become very difficult to mine at that time. It’s based on a decentralized open-source network for payment that runs on a script algorithm. This means that you don’t require a high-quality processing unit to mine this digital currency.
It’s in many ways quite similar to Bitcoin. However, the point where it’s different from the bitcoin is the block generation rate. When compared to Bitcoin, Litecoin has much faster block generation rate that lets faster and easier transactions. Litecoin at present has a supply of 84 million tokens and out of them, more than 54 million tokens are in circulations. As we write this article 1 Litecoin is priced at $250 or Rs. 15,900. It can be purchased from several exchanges and it’s also accepted at many places across the globe.
Dash
Dash is a peer-to-peer open-source cryptocurrency that works on a decentralized master code network. It might be okay to say that this is a secretive version of Bitcoin. Owned by an independent organization that’s self-funded, this digital currency has enjoyed great popularity among people in the cryptocurrency market since its launch in 2014. This is what makes it worthy to feature in the top cryptocurrency list.
One of the best cryptocurrency types, this digital currency’s success is credited to its features that are much improved from the other cryptocurrencies. The improved features include PrivateSend (private activity history and balances), InstantSend (instant transactions), and decentralized governance. As we write this, 1 Dash is priced at $1034 or Rs. 65,776.
Zcash
This is the last digital currency in the list of top cryptocurrency list. It was launched in the latter parts of 2016, which makes it quite new in the cryptocurrency market. However, this new digital currency looks promising since it’s believed to be more fast and secure than other digital currencies present. The details of the transactions done through the blockchain technology of Zcash are kept very secure with the details of the sender and the receiver kept very privately.
“If Bitcoin is like HTTP for money, Zcash is https” is what the founders of Zcash claim. It offers users the choice of what they call ‘shielded’ transactions that allow for the transaction records to be encrypted using an advanced cryptographic technique that’s called a zk-SNARK developed by its team. As we write, the price of 1 Zcash is around $684 or Rs. 43,500. This new form of digital currency is growing fast and is on its way to reaching the heights of getting into the 5 top cryptocurrency list.
Here are the best cryptocurrencies that are present today. If you know about some other good digital currencies, please let us know in the comments below. If you want to read more articles related to technology, lifestyle, telecom, and gadgets please visit Trickideas.