Crypto noobs: What to tell newcomer friends about digital currency

cointelegraph.com:

Interest in crypto has been growing since the 2017 bull market and has increased even further since 2021, which saw the nonfungible token (NFT) boom and Bitcoin (BTC) hitting its highest price so far. 

So, what can a crypto investor tell family and friends who are interested in cryptocurrency? Here are some common and important questions that one can come across regarding crypto and some appropriate responses with opinions from experts in the industry.

One of the most common questions a crypto investor might get asked is what cryptocurrency is in the first place. Cryptocurrency is a digital currency that is designed to be used as a medium of exchange. This exchange can come in the form of peer-to-peer (P2P) payments and retail purchases. 

Lucaz Lee, CEO of Affyn — a mobile-based metaverse platform — told Cointelegraph, “A cryptocurrency is a digital or virtual currency designed to work as a medium of exchange. It uses cryptography to secure and verify transactions, making it difficult for anyone to create fake transactions or counterfeit money.”

Lee continued, “Additionally, cryptocurrencies are decentralized and use distributed ledger technology, meaning no central bank or government is controlling them.”

Cryptocurrencies exist on the blockchain, which is a public ledger that records all transactions that take place, making it possible for anyone to see how money moves through the network. While anyone can see how much money a user owns and how it is spent. Users need a wallet to send and receive crypto, and these wallets use alpha-numerical identifiers, which add a layer of anonymity to the users.

The main purpose behind cryptocurrency is the ability for anyone to send and receive money through a decentralized P2P network.