Hello, dear Steemians!
It seems odd to write an entire article for the sake of illuminating an emerging asset, but listen to me. Bitcoin consists of two components: firstly, a digital asset that investors can own, and, secondly, a transaction settlement network managed by miners.
To date, almost all press coverage has focused on the digital asset, with very little attention paid to the transaction settlement network. The network has gradually become one of the most interesting stories in the field of technology and finance.
Traditional networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Visa and Mastercard are managed by centralized companies that receive revenues from a single set of financial indicators. Observing the financial performance of a centralized enterprise, investors can quickly assess the state of the business, while assigning a multiple income for the evaluation.
In a decentralized world, there are thousands (or millions) of different people / organizations that uniquely coordinate resources for managing a network. For example, just like Visa and Mastercard manage a transaction settlement network, thousands of Bitcoin miners around the world work together to also launch a transaction settlement network. The incomes and financial indicators of each miner are reflected in thousands of different sets of financial indicators, which makes it incredibly difficult to evaluate or come to an assessment.
Diar, a cryptocurrency research firm, published new data that show that Bitcoin miners received $ 5.8 billion in revenue in 2018 for operating a Bitcoin transaction network. Despite the fact that it would be difficult to get full profit and loss reports for so many different mining operations, we can still take this figure of revenue and put it into context.
As can be seen from the figures above, the Bitcoin network is currently in the middle of the pack when it comes to revenue multipliers for some of the largest networks in the world. In addition, the Bitcoin revenue multiplier is actually lower than that of Visa and Mastercard — the two transaction settlement networks that are most often compared to Bitcoin.
This does not mean that Bitcoin should be assessed by multiple income, but it is a single data point that adds context to the current performance and value of the transaction calculation level. In addition, the counter argument will be that most of the miners' income in 2018 fell in the first quarter, and today those who work on the network are paid much less.
This is a fair argument. As of yesterday, the miners mined $ 6.95 million per day, which would ensure their annual forecast of $ 2.5 billion. Keeping the current market capitalization constant, it increases Bitcoin revenue by 25 times. Although it is higher than any other network, it is still reasonable, given the rapid growth rates and historical awards given to early companies / networks in an attempt to assess untapped potential.
In 2018, the settlement network for Bitcoin transactions made more than 410 billion dollars in the volume of transactions within the network and is likely to continue with a daily transaction volume of 3 billion dollars in 2019. Instead of fanatically focusing on the stock price of Bitcoin as a digital currency, more and more people should pay attention to another sleeping giant - a network of transactions.
Today it is 1/4 of Mastercard’s market capitalization and 1/6 of Visa, but I’m not surprised that Bitcoin will outperform both in the next 36 months. Outdated networks were created for a world in which we no longer live, and a decentralized network created for the future.