Bitcoin is the most popular cryptocurrency and people have seen some dramatic price surges in bitcoin during its history.
And since Bitcoin was created in 2009, the price has kept going up and up, from $0.01 to $20,000 per coin and more.
I have also heard of Bitcoin a long time ago, however for years, I have repeatedly asked myself- should I buy Bitcoin?
A lot of people would tell you that investing in Bitcoin is a good idea in 2023, however, is that true? That is why to help you to take a decision, here we have discussed what Bitcoin is, what risks are involved with Bitcoin, and everything else you should know before making an investment.
What Is Bitcoin: The Overview
Bitcoin is a blockchain technology-based true decentralized digital cryptocurrency, which was introduced back in the year 2009 by an anonymous person or group of people Satoshi Nakamoto.
The main idea behind the introduction of Bitcoin is to create a payment system that will eliminate the need for the central authority or third party to transact your asset.
It is a digital form of currency that has no real physical existence, if you want to touch this like fiat or paper currency, you won’t because it is a cryptography code that exists in the digital wallet only.
So for advice, If anyone promises you to sell Bitcoin as a physical currency in exchange for money, that is a scam for sure.
The supply of Bitcoin is limited to 21 million coins only and at present, around 18.5 million coins are in circulation supply.
The new generation of Bitcoin is fixed per block, which is in May 2020 reduced to 12.5 BTC per 10 minutes and after every 4 years, it will further reduce to 6.25 BTC per block.
Supply will reduce half after every four years and this might be the first answer to your question, should I buy Bitcoin or not.
Investment is one side and safety is another concern
Is Bitcoin Safe for Investment?
Here safety means related to the risk appetite in terms of the security or its backed agencies.
Bitcoin is a decentralized currency that is not even controlled by any central authority like banks or government and will be easy to move from one place to another.
So is it safe to buy Bitcoin?
It is a free circulating currency that is not a legal tender issued from any country or agencies that means in case of any miss fortune, you are the only responsible for the loss.
Yes, if you are technically well aware of its safety as it won’t need anyone to come to you to be stolen. Why?
If you are not holding your Bitcoin in the most secure Cryptocurrency wallet, it may be stolen. Bitcoin is an innovation of technology and adopted as a new form of currency.
Earlier we were having Gold, Copper now using Paper and plastic currency like USD, GBP, or credit and debit cards, maybe the future lies with the digital form of currency.
Bitcoin Potential And Advantages
To date, the whole world is living upon a centralized form of currency that is monitored by a few centralized governing bodies of the countries.
Those central governing bodies are responsible for the printing or minting of new currencies in the market. This means they are the controller of inflation or the decider of the price or value of that money.
The current monetary system is made in such a way that there is a guarantee of loss the value of money in the coming future.
With one negative policy of the government, bodies can disrupt the whole financial market and can create huge inflation in the market.
Like we have seen hyperinflation in Venezuela and Zimbabwe, where the value of money lost its purchasing power due to the increase in money supply and failed financial policies of the government.
To overcome these central bodies to print extra money and create hyperinflation Bitcoin is the ultimate solution.
Hence we have seen a huge spike of Bitcoin adoption by local people in Venezuela, which ensures that the purchasing power of their money will be secure enough than holding this to their local country currency.
First and foremost Bitcoin is not having any controller and its max circulation supply is already limited to 21 million coins only.
The governing policy in terms of technical code is made in such a way that no one can create or duplicate Bitcoin and not even increase the supply.
Before 2700 years when the first-time Gold was in use nobody knows that it could be as big as it is today.
Even the early adoption of Gold was a bit struggling and somewhere around 1933, I found the record from Wikipedia that holding Gold was illegal for individuals.
After that Gold was standardized and was open to exchange for USD at a fixed price and that become the full source of a monetized commodity.
Now every country is holding its gold reserve which in the current overall market values around 9 Trillion dollars.
Due to a lot of constraints with Gold and easy-to-use Bitcoin few people are claiming Bitcoin as the new form of digital gold, reasons are explained below.
Easy To Transport
Gold is a physical asset that asks for additional security and advances transport facilities to move from one place to another.
However, Bitcoin is a digital asset that can be stored or transferred somewhere in a few minutes with a single click it won’t ask for any physical transport medium to move from one place to another.
Easy To Storage
Storage of Gold will require a physical vault which must be very tight of security and under strong surveillance.
However, Bitcoin is simple and easy you can have a hardware wallet or any cold digital wallet storage where your asset will be fully secure, and the interesting thing is it could be stored in a small device like a pen drive.
Digital Verification And Transparent
Gold is a physical asset where the proof of holding of the asset can be only verified by physically visiting that vault but that is not the case with Bitcoin.
Bitcoin is a digital transparent asset at any point if anyone wants to prove its holding can visit the blockchain wallet and confirm that in just a few seconds.
Every asset movement on the network will be signed by a private key so no one can steal your Bitcoin unless he has that private digital key or you can add additional security layers.
Smaller Environmental Impact
We have seen the mining of gold, it takes a larger disruption of nature where people destroy the landscape for the sake of finding Gold out of it.
However, Bitcoin is mined on the computer which will only consume electricity which is far less destructive as compared to Gold Mining.
The above advantages themselves explain how powerful Bitcoin is and is it worth buying Bitcoin now or later?
I am sure you decide whether should I buy bitcoin or not even in 2021?
Let me tell you the Safety or Risk involved in holding Bitcoin from a legal as well as technical perspective.
Is Bitcoin Worth To Buy Or Hold?
There could be different perspectives one is its price volatility and the other is its legal challenges, so we would try to highlight both of them to uncover most of the key points.
First with Legal Challenges.
It is obvious that the central idea behind the invention of Bitcoin is to replace the current financial system which has central fiat currency.
These fiat currencies are also the power of central governing bodies and every institution like banks and governments are assuring their holders of fixed purchase value guarantee.
But still, this is not fully decentralized and we have witnessed hyperinflation or financial crisis from time to time.
The holding of Bitcoin could be challenging at this moment as it has been not accepted as a legal tender by many countries and governments are questioning its legitimacy.
We have also heard a lot of news that most countries are working on making regulations around the acceptance of Bitcoin.
From a legal perspective, we have not heard anywhere that any country has confirmed holding Bitcoin as illegal.
In a few countries like India, RBI instructed banking institutions not to support any cryptocurrency exchanges and a petition filed by a crypto enthusiast community for a hearing is in the supreme court.
But as usual, the supreme court of India in its judgment overruled the instruction given by RBI and quash the RBI circulating advice, and instructed Indian banks to support any customers dealing in cryptocurrency.
Isn’t it amazing and has no legal bar?
This put us in the chaos of what would be the future, so my advice is if you are holding Bitcoin then keep a strong eye on your local country news which clears your doubt on that.
Coming to the Price volatility it is obviously a big risk to hold Bitcoin at this early stage as we have seen that Bitcoin surged from 0.01$ to 19,000$.
Then we had a sudden drop in the price back to 3000$ which was close to a 70% drop from its all-time high price.
The current price movement is around 17,000-19000$ which is the high time in crypto so I advise avoiding investing in this situation as it will fall for sure from now or maybe after more surges till $22000.
Hence it is hard to predict the price but if so I would advise you not to invest all in Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies.
Mark cryptocurrency investment as part of the portfolio not as the whole portfolio because the Bitcoin market runs on the emotion or decisions of the country’s people.
Great positive news can spike the price overnight and the same could be the case with the price drop as in 2017 someone had bought bitcoin close to 19,000$ and he was in debt in 2018 at around $17000 when the price was $3000.
If you are quite optimistic and it got support from any of the countries then you are boom no one can stop the price spike of Bitcoin and it is worth to buy Bitcoin.
Future of Bitcoin: Is it Safe?
Out of the total 7 billion population currently 5.3 billion people are using active financial systems and the rest 1.7 are not even have the reach of any financial bodies.
Bitcoin has the potential to reach up to those 1.7 billion people and have them away to exchange their goods for some form of currency.
Bitcoin is currently in its early stage of adoption and there is currently 60 million active blockchain wallet all around the world stats taken from Statista.
It is a truly decentralized cryptocurrency that has no control of any authority and is purely driven by the people on another end its supply is also limited which fulfilled to have them standardized like Gold.
Still, we have a concern with its price volatility which is more at this moment as more sentiments run around the legitimacy of Bitcoin.
At present more than 2000+ cryptocurrencies trading in the market but Bitcoin is the only truly decentralized cryptocurrency.
Till Date, Fidelity, NASDAQ, and Bakkt have announced to start trading or experimenting with Bitcoin.
These institutions are working on factors of how to handle its volatility and minimize the market risk of trading.
- IBM Using BlockChain Technology
IBM using Stellar blockchain technology already launched its IBM Block wire which supports worldwide banks.
- Ripple for Financial institutions
Ripple(XRP) is another Digital cryptocurrency which is been accepted by multiple financial institutions due to its low transaction fees and scalable network.
- JP Morgan & Facebook Cryptocurrency
JP Morgan after watching the trend of Bitcoin has announced to launch of its own cryptocurrency and Facebook has just now released its whitepaper on the creation of a Libra Facebook Cryptocurrency.
These are all positive vibes for Cryptocurrency industries and ultimately going to boom the mother of all Cryptocurrencies Bitcoin.
Bitcoin is ultimately a digital currency and worth buying currency, which is driven by the community all over the world but it has some risk associated which might question its future worldwide adoption by the central authority.
What Are The Risks Involved With Bitcoin: You Must Know Before Investing
Before Deciding, whether is it worth to buy Bitcoin now or later it is ideal to identify potential risks associated with Bitcoin technology that may stop its future adoption.
Potential Hacking Of Bitcoin
Bitcoin is secured by its mining network where people like you or me can contribute to the hash power of the computer to solve or clear the transaction of the network.
At present billions of computers all around the world run those mining nodes to get the free reward of Bitcoin and help to secure the network.
But there is a potential risk of 51% attack, where if anyone alone is able to generate 51% of total hash power he may be able to hack the network easily.
In the virtual world, it is close to impossible but yes this is a potential risk that is creating concern for central governing bodies regarding its adoption.
Anonymous Transactions
In another part, Bitcoin’s every transaction will be anonymous in the transparent Blockchain network.
Where your identity will be defined by a pseudonymous code and no one can link that transaction with your real-world identity which may increase illegal activities.
Your transaction will be transparent in the network but no one except the owner of that transaction can confirm its actual ownership.
Price Volatility Of Bitcoin
No one can guarantee it, it’s a fixed price as in the below screenshot you can see in 7 days it moved its price by 2.49% up, and maybe in the next 7 days -14%.
The current market circulation supply is around 18.5 million coins which are almost 80% of the total supply.
According to the Forbes report, the USA is holding 75 % of the total gold reserve and its currency USD is used as a global currency for trade.
The adoption of Bitcoin can break that power and will slip power out from the federal government.
Well, it is hard to achieve as the current total worth of Gold reserve is close to 9 Trillion USD however total cryptocurrency market is around 564 Billion USD.
Do your first do intelligence while investing in Bitcoin.
Security Concern
The holding of Bitcoin is also challenging as it is a digital asset that requires proper security, a small lope hole in its security breach can finish you all hardcore earnings in a few seconds.
Scalability Issues
The other big issue is scalability, as currently, Bitcoin is able to clear only 7 transactions per second, however, other payment networks like VISA and Master card are able to clear more than 2000 transactions and are even more scalable.
Few proposals have been introduced to scale the Bitcoin transactions per second like Lightning Network, but that is still in the early phase and no one can confirm its success.
High Transaction Fees
Every transaction on the Bitcoin network will be asked for transaction fees, Where the fee will increase as the BTC price will increase which unfit Bitcoin for Micropayments.
The solution of those Transaction fees has been introduced by another Blockchain networks like EOS and Ripple etc.
Above are a few highlights of risks associated with Bitcoin being adopted globally and let me finally highlight what are the possible use cases of the Bitcoin Blockchain network.
Bitcoin Use Cases
Bitcoin’s core vision is to replace central fiat currency with decentralized cryptocurrencies and it is based on a Blockchain network.
If the real-world adoption of Bitcoin is going to happen then the only use case would be to use it as a decentralized cryptocurrency only.
No one can use Bitcoin Blockchain to build smart Contracts upon it like Ethereum(ETH) or EOS.
If you really want to Buy Bitcoin then at present there are multiple exchanges that offer to buy Bitcoin but they may charge you a lot of money as transaction fees.
Wrap Up On Should I Buy Bitcoin Now?
Bitcoin now becomes an alternative for everyone who wants to get free from centralized currency and if our motive is to make money by investment.
Then it is a highly volatile asset whose price can be changed in any direction, many people had lost billions of dollars at it’s all-time high and many made more than that as profit.
Now the real adoption or support of Bitcoin is started and many big institutions have already announced their support for the Blockchain network.
I advise investing a few of your assets in Bitcoin and let’s see how the market will respond if you are comfortable enough you can decide yours but never put all your eggs in a single bucket.
I hope you like this complete analysis and got a good idea on Is it worth to buy Bitcoin now or should I buy bitcoin in 2021 and it is a good idea or not? Let me know in the comment box your opinion about Bitcoin.
FAQ: Should I Buy Bitcoin
As there are some potential risks associated with this Bitcoin technology, many people naturally have several doubts in their minds.
Here we have answered some of those questions that can come to your mind before investing.
Q1. Should A Beginner Invest In Bitcoin?
Ans: Cryptocurrency can be a highly risky area of the market, and that is why many smart investors have already decided to put their money elsewhere.
So, beginners who want to start investing in crypto, should start small and only use the amount of money that they can afford to lose.
Q2. Is It OK To Buy Small Amounts Of Bitcoin?
Ans: If you want to be a crypto holder, then it is definitely possible even with a small amount of money.
And it is a good idea to buy a fraction of Bitcoin (BTC) and you don’t need to spend as much as the whole coin costs.
Because fractioning of BTC would give you flexibility and also makes the purchase of crypto easier.
Q3. Will Investing In Bitcoin Make You Rich?
Ans: Bitcoin is definitely not a magic asset, and your investment behavior and attitude would definitely matter.
If you buy bitcoin and keep it in your wallet, it would not make you wealthy. Yes, you can make money with it, but only if you know how to use it properly.