Bitcoin: Your 6 big questions

Bitcoin has skyrocketed in recent months, where a bitcoin was worth less than $ 0.01 in 2010 and today is worth something close to $ 4517
For several years I've been hearing from several investment experts that the bitcoin bubble is about to burst, but the truth is that prices are on the rise.
If you're willing to leave aside any prejudices and understand what's so special about bitcoin, check out 6 big doubts about bitcoin below.

The impressive appreciation of bitcoin this year has sparked worldwide interest in digital currencies. According to Google, searches for the word "bitcoin" grew 130% in the second quarter compared to the previous three months. By Google Trends you can see that in recent weeks there have been more searches for "bitcoin" than for "euro" or quite popular investments. Knowing this, I separate the doubts that lead the Brazilians to search for "bitcoin":

1)How to win with Bitcoin?

Basically there are two ways to profit from the appreciation wave of digital currencies. The first is to think of the currency as a high-risk investment and to speculate with possible movements of future appreciation.
That is, you buy bitcoin today thinking of selling more expensive tomorrow; The rules of bitcoin favor continuous valuation because there is an element of scarcity: supply is "unlimited" to 21 million currencies, while there is no ceiling for the growth of acceptance and demand.

Another way to make money is by mining bitcoins using computers. You can use your computing power and softawares to generate new coins, which are given as a reward to the miners.
Of the total 21 million bitcoins, about 16 million have already been created. The energy and machines needed to scan a bitcoin has increased over time. For this reason, mining experts say that it is now simpler and advantageous to mine other digital coins because the profit margin (currency value of less computer and energy expenditure) will be higher.

2)How to invest in bitcoin?

First you have to open an account in an exchange - that is, in a digital currency broker, which is different from stock brokers and other investments. Opening an account costs nothing and you just have to fill out a registration and send scanned copies of documents and proof of address. Then you will have to transfer a cash amount from your bank to your account at the bitcoin brokerage. The rest is the same as buying a stock: there will be a "book" of offers to buy and sell, you will put the price you are willing to pay and if there is someone willing to sell for the same price, the order will be executed.

3)What are the main broker to buy and sell?

Only five Exchanges, among them Coinbase which is currently one of the world's largest bitcoin references, available in the US, Canada, Singapore, Australia and most European countries.Another is the LocalBitcoins, which is available in virtually every country in the world.Other names well known to investors are Bittrex, which trades more than $ 500 million in digital coins in just one day, in addition to Poloniex and OKCoin.

4)How much does a bitcoin cost?

The values change every second, the exchanges constantly update the price of all digital currencies including bitcoin. Already for the investor who wants to keep an eye on the price in dollars, the best options are CoinDesk, which also publishes several daily news on digital coins.
But the best site to keep an eye on the prices of bitcoin and all other existing digital currencies is the Coin Market Cap, which shows the variation, volume, and price in dollars of all over a thousand crypto-coins.

5)How to store bitcoins?

There are basically five portfolio options:("Wallets")

Desktop: coins are downloaded and installed on a PC or laptop. In that case your wallet will hardly be hacked, but if the device gives you a problem, you can lose everything;

Online: they are "in the cloud" and are easier to access anywhere, but may be hacked, since the key to the repository is shared with the broker;

Mobile: These are wallets executed in a smartphone application. They can be used anywhere, but they carry the same risk of the wallets online;

Hardware: Stand on a thumb drive or external hard drive. Even safer than others, they are also practical to use. Just plug in a computer. However, if the device crashes, your money will disappear.

Paper: These are not so handy to use on a day to day basis, but they are the safest ones there are. The paper wallet is a physical copy or printing of your public and private keys. For transactions, you must enter codes at the time of the transaction

6)How to mine bitcoin?

Mining bitcoins is the way new coins are created. To this end, so-called miners use specific softwares that check each bitcoin operation through complicated math problems. In solving these equations, they not only end up approving the operations done by the users but also receive a reward in the case a fraction of a new bitcoin created. At first anyone could mine by using a computer. However, with the increasing complexity of the currency, today the equations are very complicated to be solved, being necessary the use of own equipment and expensive, in addition to spending a great amount of energy, which left unviable for many people to do that.Currently, this process is done by so-called "pools" of miners, who settle in countries where energy is cheap and use high performance computers to make the activity profitable.