The acute irruption of cryptocurrencies has not only shaken the political, economic, or technological world, but it has also sparked debate in other branches of society.
One of them is the environment, one of the tremendous global concerns of the 21st century. How does this new type of digital currency impact our ecosystem?
Do they have a positive or negative effect? In the following article, we will tell you everything you need to know about cryptocurrency.
The arrival of cryptocurrencies
With Bitcoin at the helm, back in 2009, it has taken the world by storm. Something that was initially thought of as a "niche" phenomenon within the Internet has led many countries to change their legislation and fine-tune tax and accounting instruments so that this new currency does not affect traditional economies.
Such has been the debate that not only has it generated intense discussions within the political and economic world, but has also reached spheres such as philosophy and the environment.
Learning more about cryptocurrencies and their history
As we pointed out earlier, the first currency, also known as cryptocurrency was Bitcoin, launched into the world back in 2009. According to what can be traced, its creation is anonymous, although its name has been known: Satoshi Nakamoto in here
The idea of this new virtual currency is that it works as an alternative form of payment, whose main characteristics are to be a secure currency without intermediaries and without having to be linked under any circumstances to the countries' central banks.
It should be remembered that these National bodies cannot devalue the currency Cryptocurrencies, by not having that relationship, maintain even greater autonomy. Other virtual currencies, such as Dash, Ripple, and Satoshi, have come to light after the first steps.
Satoshis is the smallest unit of account in Bitcoin, equalling 0.00000001 Bitcoins) to USD / EUR / CNY / GBP / RUB / CAD.
Defining Satoshi
Okay, first things first. What even is a satoshi. Let's backtrack a little bit. Bitcoin happens to be worth quite a bit on a good day, which is excellent unless we consider values that are only a fraction of a Bitcoin.
Now enters the Satoshi or Sats for short. Satoshi is a unit of measurement about the Bitcoin. Similar to how the US dollar has cents, the Bitcoin has Satoshi.
Similarly, the Satoshi also happens to be the smallest unit of measurement that can be accounted for on the blockchain. To put just how little it is into perspective, there are 100 million Satoshis in a single Bitcoin.
You might have noticed that you are often prompted to calculate in USD because most Bitcoin happens to be traded in US dollars.
We can say 0.00000001 is one Satoshi. It was important something like the Satoshi be included in the mix since it makes smaller Bitcoin transactions possible. If we were buying a pop from the local supermarket, it would get complicated if we planned on paying in 0.0003 BTC.
Instead, it might be easier to pay the USD 2.80 it is equivalent to. If we were set on using Bitcoin, we could also consider making this purchase in 30,000 Satoshi, which we would agree on sounds only slightly better than the latter. To find out more about Satoshi and converting Satoshi to USD.