USDC enables businesses to offer payment connectivity and dollar-backed financial services to more people in more places. Reserves are transparently held at regulated financial institutions with published monthly attestations. In a nutshell, you probably shouldn’t put your life savings in USDC — or any centralized stablecoin for that matter. The risk of companies going bankrupt is a tangible one in this day and age, and if that were to happen, the stablecoin could lose its peg.
Bitcoin Energy Consumption
Financial and Federal Reserve authorities strictly regulate and oversee it to maintain and encourage a stable, reliable money system that protects consumers and businesses alike. International balances were settled in dollars and converted to gold at a fixed exchange rate. It began to see widespread use in the 20th century when the US dollar was decoupled from the price of gold. The live Bitcoin price today is $67,677.77 USD with a 24-hour trading volume of $32,714,273,264 USD. The current CoinMarketCap ranking is #1, with a live market cap of $1,335,231,073,253 USD. On the flip side, countries like China have moved to heavily clamp down on Bitcoin mining and trading activities.
Who Are the Founders of USDC?
Digital assets do not typically have legal tender status and are not covered by deposit protection insurance. The past performance of a digital asset is not a guide to future performance, nor is it a reliable indicator What is USD Coin of future results or performance. Additional disclosures can be found on the Legal and Privacy page. Launched in 2018, USD Coin is a relatively new digital currency that has its value pegged to the US dollar.
Digital currencies and fiat money
- Bitcoin is the first decentralized, peer-to-peer digital currency.
- Circling back to USDC though, the digital currency is backed by a consortium of companies, called Centre.
- The year-to-date return on Bitcoin is -35% as of this writing, for example.
- Over the past few decades, consumers have become more curious about their energy consumption and personal effects on climate change.
- It began to see widespread use in the 20th century when the US dollar was decoupled from the price of gold.
- Circle and Coinbase are both heavily invested in staying on the good side of global regulators.
MicroStrategy has by far the largest Bitcoin portfolio held by any publicly-traded company. The business analytics platform has adopted Bitcoin as its primary reserve asset, aggressively buying the cryptocurrency through 2021 and 2022. As of August 30, 2022, the company had 129,699 Bitcoin in its reserve, equivalent to just over $2.5 billion. As mentioned previously, USD Coin is backed by two of the largest names in the payments and cryptocurrency exchange industries.
- Waning public trust is another factor that could mar a stablecoin’s stability, but that has yet to happen in the stablecoin industry.
- The coin was created to be a form of digital money that wouldn’t be subject to wild price swings.
- Traditionally, Ethereum’s own cryptocurrency, ether (ETH), was used for payments connected to these smart contracts.
- However, those who want to use the U.S. dollar as a payment or reward system for their customers, employees or partners can access these services easily through USDC’s Payouts solution.
- Schnorr Signature allows users to aggregate several signatures into one for a single transaction.
- The only exception to that rule is if you live someplace where the US dollar is far more stable than the local currency.
In case you haven’t heard about stablecoins yet, they are a distinct class of cryptocurrencies. U.S. Dollar Coin (USDC) is one of the most popular stablecoins — a type of cryptocurrency that keeps its price pegged to the same price as another asset, in this case, the U.S. dollar. While fiat money has been the norm since the early 1970s, the emergence of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin has been gaining acceptance in government and business.
How Do I Buy USDC?
While USDC’s value is based on the value of the U.S. dollar, Bitcoin’s value is derived from its limited supply. If you’re keeping score, currently, there are roughly 19 million Bitcoins in the marketplace. Crypto believers say this scarcity will enable the coin’s value to continue rising over time. Stablecoins like USDC are used differently than cryptos like Bitcoin (BTC) or Ethereum (ETH), which fluctuate in price. The sole purpose of this crypto is to provide a stable store of value, rather than provide an asset that, theoretically, appreciates in value over time. USD Coin is the currently the second-largest stablecoin, with a current market capitalization of $73 billion.
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