Is it worth it to invest in cryptocurrencies?

[RickMorris]

Cryptocurrencies are digital assets people use as investments and for online purchases. You exchange real currency, like dollars, to buy “coins” or “tokens” of a certain type of cryptocurrency.

Think of it this kind Cryptocurrency is kind of like swapping out your money in a new country. A Benjamin can buy you a nice dinner in the States, but if you require to enjoy fine dining in Italy, you ’ll require some euros. We value dollars and euros because we know we can buy goods or services with them. The same goes for cryptocurrency. You exchange your money for Crypto and use it just like real money (at places that accept it as a type of payment).

You have presumably heard of people making (or losing!) hundreds of thousands of dollars by investing in cryptocurrency.

What Types of Cryptocurrency Are There?

Bitcoin is the top dog that everyone knows about, but it’s not the only kind of cryptocurrency out there. There’s Ethereum, CRD Network, Dogecoin, Polkadot, Chainlink, Mooncoin... and, oh, just about other kinds of weirdly named coins coming up the ranks.

Bitcoin

Yeah, it’s the household name that maximum people suppose of when you talk about cryptocurrency. That’s because it was the first cryptocurrency, and it’s been around for a while now. Bitcoin was created in 2009 by an unknown person who goes by the secret name Satoshi Nakamoto — whoever that is.1 And that big secret is part of its underground sense that people like. But there’s no denying the reality that everything anonymous is super shady.

Ethereum

This one is the coming most favorite cryptocurrency after Bitcoin. And indeed though Ethereum is like Bitcoin with its crypto coins ( called Ether), it’s a little distinct too. Ethereum is a bit more complex because it allows its users to “mine” their coins. What does that indeed mean? In the crypto world, mining happens when people apply their computers to solve super complicated math challenges that produce clear new crypto deals are correct, which adds to the blockchain (aka the receipt). These people “ mining” are then paid in — you imagined it — Ether coins.

CRD Network

The CRD Network provides a technology infrastructure that pairs the power of financial technology (fintech) with the power of influencer demand, to spur the adoption of decentralized finance (DeFi) applications. The CRD Network smoothens interoperability between the worlds of centralized finance and decentralized finance (DeFi). It runs on Hyperledger Besu, an enterprise blockchain on Ethereum, and uses CRD Nodes and APIs to operate.This infrastructure enables third-party developers to build a wide variety of fintech applications on top of it.

Dogecoin

Dogecoin ( pronounced “dohj-coin”) started as a joke back in 2013 and is now the hottest thing to invest in. At the time, there was a meme going around of a Shiba Inu (that’s a kind of dog). The founders of Dogecoin named their cryptocurrency after the “ Doge” meme, it became their mascot, and the rest is internet history. Oh, we ’re serious. You can not make this stuff up.

Is it worth it to invest in cryptocurrencies?

Plain and simple — Yes, we can invest in cryptocurrencies.

[MongiIG]

On 09/01/2022 at 17:57, RickMorris said:

to spur the adoption of decentralized finance (DeFi) applications. The CRD Network smoothens interoperability between the worlds of centralized finance and decentralized finance (DeFi).

Hi @RickMorris

Thanks for sharing.

“There is a lot of pump in the market at the moment,” says Paycer UG founder & CTO Nils Gregersen in Hamburg, Germany. . “I think in 2022 we are going to see a little cooldown in the market. Only the stronger projects will survive. For the memecoins and other projects, I think the air gets a little thinner for them,” he says, adding that regulations will have an impact on DeFi cryptocurrencies, within varying degrees of positives and negatives. Forbes article

[MongiIG]

On 09/01/2022 at 17:57, RickMorris said:

Is it worth it to invest in cryptocurrencies?

Plain and simple — Yes, we can invest in cryptocurrencies.

Learning how to invest in general can be intimidating to most people. The complexity of cryptocurrency can be on another level entirely. A new technology that has the potential to disrupt a wide range of industries certainly attracts attention. And while the returns thus far have been nothing short of spectacular, a lot still needs to be proven before people view the asset class less as a speculative tool and more like a legitimate wealth generator.

If you're seriously considering investing in cryptocurrencies, you've come to the right place to help you find the answer.

It depends on what you believe

According to McKinsey, a consulting firm, the amount of wealth in the world today is north of $500 trillion. This figure includes financial assets, like stocks, bonds, and cash, and real assets, like machinery, equipment, and real estate. This value more than tripled from 2000 to 2020.

As things stand today, the entire crypto ecosystem, worth $2 trillion, makes up less than 0.5% of global wealth. Even as the cryptocurrency market skyrocketed more than 11,500% over the past five years, this is no doubt still a tiny amount in the grand scheme of things.

You must be wondering what I'm trying to get at by throwing out all these crazy numbers. Well, whether or not you should invest in cryptocurrencies boils down to one question: Do you believe that crypto's proportion of global wealth will increase or decrease in the future? There's no need for a complex financial model. At a high level, it really is that simple.

In my opinion, cryptocurrencies will grow their share of total worldwide wealth. I believe this for two primary reasons. First, the entire industry has proven its resilience and shown that it isn't just a fad. Crypto rose in popularity and garnered a lot of attention in 2017, and prices soared. After values came crashing down, crypto flew under the radar until after the pandemic took hold in mid-2020. Since then, we've seen a steady increase in value, as well as significant innovation.

And this leads me to the next point. There is so much talent gravitating toward crypto that it's hard not to believe that this technology is here to stay. Similar to when the internet first came onto the scene in the late 1990s, digital assets are a playground for speculation, but more importantly, for entrepreneurs looking to build viable businesses. As a result, I think it's a safe assumption that cryptocurrencies will increase their share of global wealth over time.

Here's a good place to start

A good rule of thumb is to only invest money into crypto that you are comfortable losing. Even with the astronomical rise of crypto prices, we can't forget that this is still a nascent and volatile asset class that has a lot left to prove. Only you know your financial situation, but even more importantly, only you know your psychological makeup. Therefore, investing an amount that allows you to sleep well at night, while not having an adverse impact on your financial picture should things go downhill, is vital.

Once you've settled on a dollar amount, Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) and Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) are excellent places to start. Both have long track records, deep developer networks, heightened institutional interest, and liquidity. Combined, they make up about 59% of the entire crypto market.

Created and released in 2009, Bitcoin was the world's first cryptocurrency project. It is a decentralized payments network, a system that allows anyone in the world to send money to anyone else with low (or no) fees. The breakthrough innovation was that all of this is possible without the need for a central authority. Bitcoin is slowly gaining mainstream adoption as a legitimate payment mechanism.

With its current value approaching $400 billion, Ethereum is the next prominent cryptocurrency behind Bitcoin. What makes Ethereum different, and better to some, is that it is a programmable blockchain. Self-executing software, known as smart contracts, can be built on top, again without the need of a central authority. Ethereum has spawned massive innovation with decentralized applications and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

Hopefully you now have some clarity when it comes to investing (or not) in cryptocurrencies. It's an exciting, fast-changing, and disruptive technology that should be on everyone's radar. nasdaq.com article

[MongiIG]

2021 was a banner year for cryptocurrency, with digital tokens, such as bitcoin and dogecoin, hitting all-time highs and making millionaires of investors. The overall crypto market briefly surpassed $3 trillion in value and the growing popularity of digital assets like nonfungible tokens, or NFTs, helped bring the once-niche technology to the mainstream.

While tokens like bitcoin and dogecoin have different levels of technological development and scarcity, both saw strong growth in 2021, along with other top coins. Read on to see what a $1,000 investment in four popular cryptocurrencies at the start of the year would be worth now. (All prices are as of 3:30 p.m. on December 28.)

But take it with a grain of salt: When it comes to crypto, remember that past performance is no guarantee of future returns, and experts caution investors to put no more money into cryptocurrencies than they are comfortable losing.

If you do decide to get into crypto, consider not making a large purchase all at once, but instead dollar-cost averaging by spreading it out into smaller purchases over time.

Bitcoin

• Price on Jan. 1: $29,290
• Price on Dec. 28: $47,795.40

A $1,000 investment in bitcoin at the beginning of the year at a price of $29,290 would have bought you 0.034 tokens, which would be worth about $1,632 at Tuesday afternoon’s price of $49,150 per coin.

The world’s largest cryptocurrency by market cap had a strong 2021, with its value increasing about 65% between Jan. 1 and late December. In February, it hit a $1 trillion market cap for the first time, but has since pulled back to close to $900 billion.

Ether

 

 

INA FASSBENDER | AFP | Getty Images

• Price on Jan. 1: $730.30
• Price on Dec. 28: $3,816.67

The value of a single ether, the the Ethereum blockchain’s token, is up more than 400% over the past 12 months. A $1,000 ether purchase on Jan. 1 at a price of $730.30 would now be worth about $5,226.16 at Tuesday afternoon’s price of $3,816.67.

 

Supporters of Ethereum say the blockchain will become more scalable, secure and sustainable after its Eth2 upgrade, slated for 2022, during which the network will shift to a proof of stake, or PoS, model. Currently, Ethereum operates on a proof of work model, where miners must compete to solve complex puzzles in order to validate transactions. This model is frequently criticized for its environmental impact since it requires an extreme amount of computer power.

The shift to PoS will allow users to validate transactions according to how many coins they hold, rather than the energy-intensive mining rigs used now.

Solana

• Price on Jan. 1: $1.53
• Price on Dec. 28: $181.18

If you had invested $1,000 in the Solana blockchain’s native cryptocurrency SOL at the beginning of 2021, when one coin cost $1.53, your investment would have grown to about $118,418 at Tuesday’s price of $181.18.

Despite only launching in 2020, Solana grew by more than 13,800% over the past year and is currently the No. 5 biggest cryptocurrency with a market cap over $57 billion. Solana is seen as a competitor to the Ethereum blockchain. Its founder, Anatoly Yakovenko, designed Solana to support smart contracts, which are collections of code that carry out a set of instructions on the blockchain, and the creation of decentralized applications, or dapps.

Dogecoin

 

 

Yuriko Nakao | Getty Images News | Getty Images

• Price on Jan. 1: $0.0056
• Price on Dec. 28: $0.18

If you put $1,000 into dogecoin at the start of the year at a price of $0.0056 per coin, it would now be worth $32,142 at Tuesday’s price of 18 cents. Not bad for a digital token that started out as a meme-inspired joke.

The cryptocurrency, whose popularity was fueled in part by Elon Musk, grew by as much as as much as 12,000% in the first half of 2021. However, dogecoin’s value fell in the latter half of the year. CNBC article