Hi Everyone in the academy, and greetings to professor @stream4u for the wonderful and very educative lessons as well the opportunity to participate in the beginner's task. #### *What Is Cryptocurrency and How You Would Like To See Cryptocurrency In The Future?* The advancement of technology has rapidly taken over all sectors of today's society as well as our daily living, even down to expenditures, a lot of people in today's world hardly ever carries cash around, and has bought into the cashless policy in which most people either make use of their bank cards to purchase stuffs or digitally through their mobile phones by making bank transfers and so on. #### WHAT IS CRYPTOCURRENCY ![image.png](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmYQoqtkKy2zzbXWK2Ae4KyaSg34Ciyxqwoq6J8mKQosW2/image.png) It will be Fascinating to know that despite how technology has advanced over the years, a lot of people still haven't heard about cryptocurrency, while some have heard of it but don't really know what it is or stands for. Cryptocurrency is a digital currency in each transaction occurs only in the decentralized system in the blockchain, or I would say is a payment system in a digital form in which to and fro payments are made with any verification of a third party involvements like banks and etc.. These transactions are properly recorded in the decentralized system with the help of cryptography instead of the regular centralised body. Bitcoin was the first ever Cryptocurrency that was created back in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto, and this gave rise to a new generation of currency in a different style, and in 2015 Ethereum was also created by Vitalik Buterin, and since then till now a whole lot of other Cryptocurrencies has been created and are still created daily. ![image.png](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmYJB2N1Nv3HwpndwNP4LLadqnR6ePrbrt5siUkN6hbi9j/image.png)[source](https://www.finyear.com/Is-Cryptocurrency-the-Future-of-Money_a41914.html) Cryptocurrency is not like a regular fiat currency that can be stored in the bank, carried in a van or so on, but it is stored in a digital wallet, and these wallets can be accessed through a phone or even a computer, and each transaction is fully recorded on the blockchain which makes it difficult to forge or even replicate payment, because information in the blockchain chain are encrypted are as a result safety is utmostly guaranteed. #### How To Acquire Cryptocurrency Cryptocurrency can be acquired in several ways, and will be highlighting a few below 1. THROUGH AN EXCHANGE: - This is like the surest way to acquire cryptocurrency, if you remember in the early cause of this post, I mentioned that cryptocurrency can't be saved in the bank neither also can it be gotten there as well, so in quest to get the cryptocurrency, there are several exchanges like *Binance*, *Coinbase*, *Kraken* etc, you would have to visit their sites, register with them then purchase cryptocurrency using your bank card infos depends on the quantity to want, and can transfer them to your ewallet, and if you don't have an ewallet, you can download any of your choice bu searching through Playstore or Applestore etc. 2. MINING: - This is yet another way to acquire cryptocurrency, take for instance, in the earliest era lots of people had the opportunity to mine bitcoin, and even till now most cryptos are still mined but requires lots of costs as well as energy. Currently there's a new cryptocurrency trying to make wave into the crypto world its called *"Pi"* currently its in the mining stage and gas the ability to be mined using your mobile phone by just downloading the app register and just mine away. 3. PEER TO PEER :- Yes that's right, this is also another means to receive cryptocurrency. Most businesses owners now receive crypto payments from their business associates or clients after rendering services or selling goods, take for instance, Elon Musk's company now receives bitcoin payment for car purchases and etc. but one needs to have a Crypto ewallet in order to recieve payments in Cryptocurrency. #### TRADING AND STORAGE OF CRYPTOCURRENCIES #### TRADING Trading itself involves buying and selling of goods in exchange for money, and the trading of Cryptocurrency is not any different, because it also has to do with buying and selling of Cryptos as well but this can be done in Crypto exchange market, examples are *Bit-finance, Huobi Global, Binance, Bithumb, Gate.io, coinone, FTX, Kraken, Bittrex* and so many others. #### STORAGE Storage has to do with keeping safe for later use, and so the storage of cryptocurrency is achieved only when you have a Crypto wallet and this can be done by oneself, by downloading a wallet of your choice out of the numerous choices of wallet, and according to report, as at February 2021 there are 82 Crypto wallets available. Examples of some crypto wallets are * Coinbase, electrum wallet, Infinito wallet, Wired, Xapo, etc. You can safely store your Cryptos in any wallet of your choice, but you must make sure to keep you passphrase password a secret, because if gotten in the wrong hands, you could loose all your assets. CHARACTERISTICS OF CRYPTOCURRENCY 1. Transactions with Cryptos are really fast and to any part of the world, unlike the regular currency transactions done to other countries in the bank, may take up to days in order to complete transaction, but Cryptocurrencies transaction happens in seconds, whether locally or internationally. 2. All transactions done are ran on the blockchain, and this in turns guarantee safety because it cannot be tampered with while on the blockchain, as well as reliability. #### HOW I WOULD LIKE TO SEE CRYPTOCURRENCY IN THE FUTURE ![image.png](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmWAa13AawKUHEwzKUctx2oqKWZGS49Ad9pqEQvCuHJVhb/image.png)[source](https://online.stanford.edu/future-for-cryptocurrency)[source](https://www.acuant.com/blog/how-anonymous-is-cryptocurrency/) To be honest, each time I take a reflection through the history of Cryptocurrency far back when the bitcoin was founded in 2009 I knew it was an evolution that was attained, and was quite excited about this. In the nearest future I would love the Cryptocurrencies to fully take over the Financial sector, not eradicate the fiat currency though, but will be be the major form of currency while the fiat currency will be second to it. Already most business owners are receiving payment in Cryptos, I would also like this method to be adopted by every other business owners, and in other to have more stability, I would also like the Cryptocurrencies have a general standard of stability in order to avoid the kind of dip that happened recently with the bitcoin that caused a lot of losses to those who posses them, because if such occurrence persist it will be quite difficult for every business owners to fully adapt the Crypto payment methods. #### In Conclusion Cryptocurrency is the future of Currency as well as the blockchain, because the availability of the blockchain made Crypto possible as well as other things, and I believe Crypto has finally come to stay despite the current dip and some instability, I believe everything will be more stable, and everyone will continue to enjoy a much more ease of access in the Banking industry.