Bitcoin
Digital money that lives on the internet and that nobody controls alone: not a bank, not a government.
📖 Its story
In 2008, someone who signed with the name Satoshi Nakamoto shared an idea on the internet: digital money you could send from person to person without going through a bank. In January 2009 it started working. To this day, nobody knows for sure who Satoshi is.
🧩 Is it a company?
No. Bitcoin has no owners, no stores and no sales. A stock is a tiny piece of a company that makes money; a bitcoin is more like gold: it's worth whatever people are willing to pay for it. That's why its price can go way up or way down in just a few days.
⚙️ How it works
Thousands of computers around the world keep a copy of the same notebook of accounts, called the blockchain. Every time someone sends bitcoins, all of them check it and write it down. Since there are so many copies, it's very hard to cheat.
🤯 Fun fact
In 2010, a programmer paid 10,000 bitcoins for two pizzas. Today those bitcoins would be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Every May 22, people celebrate "Bitcoin Pizza Day".
👍 The good part
There will only ever be 21 million bitcoins, never more. You can send it anywhere in the world, at any time.
⚠️ The risk
It goes up and down much more than a stock. It doesn't pay dividends. And if someone loses their key, they lose their bitcoins forever.
🏦 How do grown-ups buy it?
Since January 2024, the US stock market has had Bitcoin funds (ETFs): you buy them just like a stock, with their letters, and the fund keeps the bitcoins for you. So in your parents' investing app, Bitcoin can be bought like any other stock. One example is the fund with the letters IBIT.
🧠 Did you get it?
What's the most bitcoins there will ever be?
🗂️ Quick facts
- Born in: 2009
- Created by: Satoshi Nakamoto (a made-up name; nobody knows who it is)
- Home: none: it lives on thousands of computers across the internet
🎮 Try it in the game
Put Bitcoin in your basket on the Monitor and compare it with your favorite companies. Soon you'll also be able to buy it with your Monis.
Build my basketJust for learning: not a recommendation to buy Bitcoin or any cryptocurrency.