2017: Bitcoin Highlights
The year, 2017 will be remembered as a year when Bitcoin touched new highs. Many wouldn’t have predicted its meteoric rise in 2017. What started with a paper published by the still anonymous Satoshi Nakamoto has evolved into a widespread phenomena. Multiple events in the past few years have helped contribute to the powerhouse that bitcoin has become today. Even the most outspoken critics must admit that we leave this year with cryptocurrencies being accepted by the mainstream public. This is the year when Bitcoin went mainstream.
A real asset
Internally, the bitcoin community enjoyed a massive confidence boost. With the community growing and more wealth to re-invest, it continues to thrive and innovate like never before. Disputes are no longer perceived as an existential risk. Bitcoin hasn’t only aged well, but also brought communities together and inspired breakthroughs in new directions.
Amongst other things, bitcoin has dominated Google’s top searches in 2017. People from around the globe have been searching for questions like “How to buy Bitcoin”, “How to mine Bitcoin”, “What is Bitcoin”. Interest in the cryptocurrency in 2017 has helped drive a nearly 1,000% rally.
Here are a few highlights of 2017 that made Bitcoin what it is today:
Price
Bitcoin grew more than 1000% over the year
The year 2017 saw an exponential rise in bitcoin prices within just 12 months, rising from $1,000 in January and closing around $16,000 in December. On the very same day, the price of BTC had surpassed $13,000 and breached $14,000 mark.
On December 6, the price of bitcoin astonished the world again by reaching $15K per coin. At this time, two of the largest foreign exchanges in the world, Cboe and CME group, were planning to launch bitcoin derivatives products for mainstream investors. Over the next week, bitcoin’s value rallied to $17,000 and then reached at an all-time high of $19,600 per BTC on December 16th — 17th.
The price almost touched $20,000 milestone this year, all this while witnessing a phenomenal 1500% rise in price.
Users
India is racing ahead on the bitcoin front as well — with Zebpay reaching 3 million + users. According to Google Trends, interest in bitcoins has been on a one way trajectory ever since last year, with lakhs of users signing up on exchanges and investing in large numbers.
The world’s largest futures exchange, CME, launched bitcoin futures in the second week of December. The move marked another step toward legitimizing a digital asset that was once only the focus of some cryptocurrency developers. As of 25 Jan 2018, CME had registered trading volumes of nearly 840 bitcoins already.
Acceptance
The number of Blockchain wallets has been growing since the creation of the bitcoin in 2009, numbering approximately 15 million Blockchain wallet users in September 2017.
Some call this Bitcoin’s “IPO moment”. The first mark of this “IPO moment” is a change in perception. In 2017, we’ve seen Bitcoin taken more seriously by media, regulators, the public and the mainstream financial system. This change is accelerated by greed and controversy, but it is still fundamental and undeniable.
Is Bitcoin finally mainstream?
Despite challenges on several fronts — there is now a strong sentiment that cryptocurrencies are here to stay, and that Bitcoin has emerged as one of the most popular cryptocurrencies. Even Christine Lagarde (MD for the International Monetary Fund) recently theorized that currencies like Bitcoin could be adopted by countries with shaky monetary systems, in what she calls “Dollarization 2.0”.
Introduction of Bitcoin Cash
The lead developer behind the project revealed there would be a hard fork on August 1, 2017 that would produce Bitcoin Cash (BCH). The BCH network was born that day and produced a cryptocurrency with the same history as the legacy chain but now included an 8MB block size limit, and the removal of Segwit.
Consequently, we saw many other hard forks from bitcoin. But the main legacy chain continues to thrive. Such challenges shouldn’t come across as a surprise when we’re dealing with such a decentralized community. But it is important to note that bitcoin has maintained its numero uno position in the cryptocurrency market.
Overall, 2017 was an important year for Bitcoin, with its price racing towards the $20,000 milestone and many more advancements such as Bitcoin futures. In 2018, Bitcoin has set a high bar for itself and the community is charged up to surpass greater milestones this year and evolve as being widely accepted.
