Price per bitcoin chart exchange rates

Bitcoin is a digital currency based on an open-source peer-to-peer software protocol that is independent of any central authority. Bitcoin issuance and transactions are carried out collectively by the Bitcoin network. Bitcoin relies on cryptography to secure and validate transactions, and is thus often referred to as a "cryptocurrency".

Bitcoins can be "mined" by users, and also transferred from user to user, directly via computer or smartphone without the need for any intermediary financial institution. Bitcoin transactions are pseudonymous and decentralized. Proponents of Bitcoin argue that it is not susceptible to devaluation by inflation or seigniorage in the way other modern "fiat" currencies are.

Nor is it associated with an arbitrary store of value such as gold, unlike hard-money or representative currencies. The Bitcoin protocol was first described by Satoshi Nakamoto a pseudonym in Each bitcoin is divided into million smaller units called satoshis.

MtGox was the largest Bitcoin exchange in the world, until February when the site shut down and trading was suspended. It was subsequently announced on Bitcoin news that over , Bitcoins had been stolen from customers of this exchange.

Quandl provides historical data for MtGox. Note that this data stopped updating on 25 Feb Quandl has daily prices for over crypto-currencies from Cryptocoin Charts. You can view all Quandl's cryptocurrency time series on our Cryptocoin Charts source page.

Dogecoin data, from Dogecoin Average, is available from our Dogecoin Average source. If you have any questions about this data, or would like to add more datasets to Quandl, please email us. Read any article written about bitcoin in the mainstream press and odds are, at some point it touches on the incredible volatility of bitcoin's price.

Indeed, one of the largest barriers to the widespread adoption of bitcoin as a viable global currency is its volatility. However, many commentators incorrectly conflate bitcoin's current volatility with some structural, underlying flaw in bitcoin itself. Like any other currency or stock, bond or commodity , bitcoin is subject to market forces and consequently, continuous fluctuations in price. What complicates matters is that at any given time there are potentially hundreds of factors that contribute to bitcoin's exchange rate, not least of which being erratic human behavior.

This makes it incredibly challenging to come to a unified understanding of what bitcoin's price should be today, tomorrow or a year into the future. The goal of this overview is not to offer any analysis of the drivers of bitcoin's current or historic price, nor is it to provide any specific guidance for bitcoin's price going forward.

Instead it will lay out our perspective on bitcoin's adoption trajectory, and provide some hopefully useful analogs for how to think about bitcoin's price volatility in the context of other global currencies. Over the last 45 years, most countries have generally adopted "floating exchange rates" for their currencies, a system in which a currency's value is allowed to fluctuate with supply and demand. I'm sure you often hear about "a weak Yen" or "a strong Dollar"; this is describing the ever-changing value, and exchange rates of different national currencies.

Take the very real-world example of the Euro. Similarly, exchange rates for the top five global currencies US Dollar, Euro, British Pound, Japanese Yen and Swiss Franc , all fluctuate, sometimes significantly, over the course of week or month.

In fairness, the above comparison is not intended to downplay bitcoin's roller coaster performance over the past several years. Bitcoin's appreciation from effectively zero in , to USD 1, in November , and then back down to USD in January was certainly a wild ride. It was not, however, completely unexpected, and should not be viewed with any more skepticism than you might give an entirely new currency in its first few formative years. Like any other currency, bitcoin's price is driven by monetary supply and demand.

Individuals are willing to pay a particular price to exchange an amount of their home currency whether it be US Dollars or or Ukrainian Hryvnia for an amount of bitcoin based on how much value they see in it demand and how many units are in circulation supply. With respect to supply, the number of bitcoins currently in circulation as well as the total number of bitcoins that will ever be in circulation are both known quantities.