Since the beginning of time, humans have used different means to exchange services and products first there was barter system and then came the currency system. Cryptocurrency is also a digital currency and is capable of being used as a medium of exchange. Cryptocurrency uses strong cryptography to ensure the security of financial transactions. The cryptography also ensures the development of new units and also to authenticate the transfer of assets. Cryptocurrency utilizes a decentralized control system which is different from online banking or digital shopping via banks using digital currencies.

The decentralized control of cryptocurrency uses a system that is a consensus of shared, replicated and synchronized digital data which is spread globally across various websites, countries and firms. So, cryptocurrency utilizes a distributed ledger system and cryptography. The first cryptocurrency to the surface was Bitcoin, and it was also the one that gained some fame. It was released in 2009 as open-source software. Since then, more than 6000 alternatives to bitcoin in the form of decentralized cryptocurrency have surfaced. The rise in bitcoin value suddenly from being worthless to $1900 shook the world, and its current value is $7074. Many stories related to bitcoin made headlines, and the world entered a new era where many businesses started using cryptocurrency, and many users started mining it. In the upcoming report, cryptocurrencies will be discussed in detail (Narayanan, et al., 2016).

Discussion of Cryptocurrency
What are Cryptocurrencies?

Cryptocurrencies are a combination of cryptography and decentralized control. as discussed, that cryptocurrencies are virtual currencies that can be used as a medium of transaction and as there is no bank or authority to monitor the transaction. So, the question is, how does this work if there is no authority to monitor the process? Where does it come from? In order to explain these questions and the concept of cryptocurrencies, bitcoin will be used as an example since it was the first cryptocurrency to be recognized, and there was an exponential increase in its value (Nian & Chuen, 2015).

How do Cryptocurrencies work?

The first that needs to be understood is blockchain. Blockchain to be simply put is a big ledger book that keeps all the records starting when the first bitcoin emerged in January 2009. So, the blockchain is a public ledger that contains records of all the transaction between peer to peer network. And as the time passes this public ledger continues to grow and will keep growing as long as the transactions are being made using bitcoin. This blockchain is a self-making ledger and that is why it is called a chain. Since this ledger is made public for everyone and the same copy of the ledger is present globally in various locations, websites, servers and institutions it will always share the same information on it. So, if someone makes a transaction somewhere using bitcoin it will be recorded on this public ledger and as soon as the transaction takes place everyone having a copy of this public ledger will get notified about this upcoming transaction and then these people will confirm and verify that the transaction taking place is authentic. These people who authenticate the transaction are also known as “Miners”.

First step for making a transaction is to have a digital wallet. This wallet will assign your transaction a public key and a private key. This public key will tell the miners that the transaction was indeed made by you. Then the miners will use the public key and verify it against computational algorithms. This process makes sure that no fraud is taking place. This process is cryptographic hash function using SHA256 (Swan, 2015).

Why are cryptocurrencies popular?

Why people do mining? What need is there for them to spend time and resources verifying these transactions? Furthermore, why is everyone crazed for these cryptocurrencies and becoming a miner? In order to get answers to these questions we will take a look at the mining process. People set up huge rigs which take thousands of dollars to build, and these computational rigs run 24/7, therefore huge electrical bills. So, what is the catch? The catch is that the first person to verify the transaction gets twelve and a half bitcoins. Moreover, one bitcoin currently is worth $7074 United States dollars. So, for validating one transaction before everyone, one gets a total of $88,425 United States dollars. And that is a good enough reason for cryptocurrencies to be popular. But the bitcoin reward function is built to halve itself every four years, so this popularity might not stay the same for bitcoin over the years and that is why there are other cryptocurrencies as well and this also ensures to keep the number of bitcoins ever made to be finite and that is twenty-one million. And this hype is the thing that gives theses cryptocurrencies their value. It is a simple matter of supply and demand (Böhme, et al., 2015).

Top cryptocurrencies in 2020

Top cryptocurrencies in the today market are (Yi, et al., 2018):

· Bitcoin

· Ethereum

· NEO

· EOS

· Ripple

Businesses utilizing Cryptocurrencies

Some people go with the change, some resist change and some are insightful they predict change and prepare for it before time. Here some businesses will be discussed that were insightful enough to adopt cryptocurrencies:

International Businesses of Cryptocurrency

1. JP Morgan Chase: It is one of the biggest banking institutes in the world, and it has adopted the use of blockchain technology. It uses Quorum blockchain and currently trying to introduce its JPM coin.

2. IBM: It is a well-known name in technological industry. IBM is utilizing stellar blockchain.

3. Ubisoft: Ubisoft is trying to implement cryptocurrency in games using Ethereum blockchain.

4. Square Inc.: It is a payment company that is using bitcoins.

5. Google: is building datasets for many cryptocurrencies including bitcoin and Litecoin.

Businesses in UAE of Cryptocurrency

Trending and popular cryptocurrency-based businesses in UAE are:

· Telegram: Telegram has over 200 Million users. It has its headquarters in UAE. It is on of the most popular encryption-based messaging service. Recently it has taken great interest in cryptocurrency. Telegram is planning to open its cryptocurrency service and blockchain of its own using its $1.7B private tokens. This blockchain will be known as “Telegram Open Network” Blockchain. It will be much rapid and secure than bitcoin and Ethereum.

· BitOasis: It surfaced in 2015 and is one of the largest exchange markets in the middle east region for cryptocurrency. This company is using its digital wallet and provides exchange services to newly flourishing markets. The company is planning to start working with the UAE government to develop laws around cryptocurrency. This company is also planning to become registered for cryptocurrency and expand its horizons to Saudi Arabia and other developing markets as well.

Disadvantages of cryptocurrencies of Cryptocurrency

Cryptocurrency, despite having many advantages like everything, also have some disadvantages and below these disadvantages will be discussed (Bunjaku, et al., 2017):

· Not accepted everywhere: The first and common disadvantage of cryptocurrency is that it is not used everywhere. Yes, there are many companies and firms where one can use these cryptocurrencies to make transactions, but it is far from being implied in day to day transactions. It does not seem possible in the foreseeable future to go to a shop and buy something using cryptocurrency. Most of the people will not even know about it, and it will take years implementing this currency in our system worldwide.

· Highly Technical: It is not easy for most of the population to understand its working and usage. There is a concept like public keys, private keys, hash checking, key validation, mining that are hard for the general public to grasp.

· Some cryptocurrencies are a scam: Since there are no official laws regarding cryptocurrencies and their creation and distribution. So many people are taking advantage of this and create fake currencies and are selling them in exchange for other currencies and are fooling people and are practicing fraudulent behaviour.

· Cryptocurrency is limited: As it was discussed above, cryptocurrency is limited. It is not produced according to demand, but its no is fixed. Therefore, this creates huge complications for being able to use cryptocurrency on a large scale by governments and other big firms (Jafari, et al., 2018).

· Continuously fluctuating: Since the supply of cryptocurrency is finite and limited, but demand can vary in the market; this creates continuous fluctuations in the value of cryptocurrencies, and this makes its use difficult in the free-market economy.

· Irreversible Transactions: Transactions made using cryptocurrencies are irreversible. There is no way to get back your money or cancel a transaction when it has been done. So, this creates certain difficulties for doing business using cryptocurrencies.

· No Support: If one loses or forgets his password of the digital wallet. There is no place to get help from for retrieving it and he is on its own. Moreover, in case of any complications or problems, there is no place to file a complaint and get a response.

Conclusion of Cryptocurrency

Cryptocurrency is trending, and it has its charms; that is why it is attracting lots of businesses. However, it is still far from complete to be capable of being used in day to day transactions. There are many exploitable loopholes present. Its biggest charm of being open source and without any supervising authority becomes its most significant fault when we consider its use by the general public. It is new and technologically advanced for most of the public, and it will take a lot of constitution modification and law-making for its implementation on a bigger scale. In short, it is a great opportunity, and if one has resources, he should go for it while keeping all the pros and cons in mind.

References of Cryptocurrency

Böhme, Christin, Edelman & Moore, 2015. Bitcoin: Economics, technology, and governance. Journal of economic Perspectives, 29(2), pp. 213-238.

Bunjaku, Gorgieva-Trajkovska & Miteva-Kacarski, 2017. Cryptocurrencies–advantages and disadvantages.. Journal of Economics, 2(1).

Jafari, Vo-Huu, Jabiyev & Mera, 2018. Cryptocurrency: A challenge to legal system.. Reza, Cryptocurrency: A Challenge to Legal System.

Narayanan, et al., 2016. Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technologies: a comprehensive introduction.. Princeton University Press.

Nian & Chuen, 2015. Introduction to bitcoin. Handbook of digital currency, pp. 5-30.

Swan, M., 2015. Blockchain: Blueprint for a new economy. s.l.:O'Reilly Media, Inc..

Yi, Xu & Wang, 2018. Volatility connectedness in the cryptocurrency market: Is Bitcoin a dominant cryptocurrency?. International Review of Financial Analysis, Volume 60, pp. 98-114.