Six years after the overwhelming launch of Bitcoin across the world in 2009, a potential alternative to the throne of blockchain poweredvirtual currency was developed. Ethereumwas developed more than just means of virtual currency, it was meant to overcome the shortcomings witnessed by Bitcoin. Does this new commerce positively possess the potential to outscore its rival, let us find out!

Inherent Structure

Bitcoin

Bitcoin is the purest form of virtual currency. No other services or modifiable contracts are attached to its developed algorithm. Its only goal is to establish a secure peer-to-peer decentralized payment system. Being the very first successful cryptocurrency in terms of storing value & recognitions, it sits on an eye catching $115 billions of market capitalization, which in itself is 42.51% of total market cap of all cryptocurrencies.

Ethereum

Ethereumis also a decentralized platform that serves the basic purpose of virtual currency, but it is also close to the modern notation i.e. ‘smart currency’. Its applications run on custom built blockchain technology that runs ‘smart contracts’. Needless to say,that they are also decentralized. Its smart contracts possess all qualities of a traditional contract while powered by modern age blockchain tech. But make no mistake about the size of the newly developed platform, the way Ethereum Price has progressed over last few years, it also stands on a ravishing $48 billions of market capitalization, which is 17.68% of total market cap of all cryptocurrencies in the world.

Potential advantages and limitations of top two crypto giants

Out of over 1600 cryptocurrencies available worldwide, Bitcoin enjoys the edge of largest market capitalization and highest price among all cryptocurrency prices. Bitcoin is the most widely accepted means of payment than any other crypto developed yet.But its supply style is deflationary in nature as only a finite number of bitcoin can be made overtime, i.e. 21 million in total, which raises a question on its capability of meeting the demand in near future.

On the other side, even with less than half of market cap and only 6.5% in price compared to bitcoin, Ether is pacing itself. It overtook bitcoin in the number of daily transactions in the middle of 2017. With more than double the number of transactions taking place with Ether, it can be rightfully said that it has earned a material acceptability in much shorter time, which is positive for its existence in future world. Moreover, its supply style is inflationary in nature and more tokens can be made over time.


The future of Bitcoin and Ethereum

Being the inherent design of bitcoin to act as a secure peer to peer decentralized payment system, every transaction is sown on the public ledger, the blockchain. You can be confident that the transaction is legitimate and the need to trust other party is negated. A Bitcoin transaction will show up in as little as one hour and is highly secure. Well bitcoin offers the very basic need of future customer, as simple as that.

While Ethereum is currently working towards changing to a proof-of-stake model. In a proof-of-stake model there will no longer be miners, but validators. There will no longer be cryptographic challenges, the difficult mathematical problems that miners must solve. Validators will be required to own ether and in order to validate a block they will be required to put their owned ether on the line to certify that a block is valid. This way, if there is malicious behaviour or a validator does something invalid they will lose their stake i.e. their owned ether.

Conclusion

One thing the public expects from a currency is being able to easily spend it. Bitcoin provides that very basic feature without much complexity of writing a whole contract. Thus, without wagering a sure overhaul from ETH to BTC we expect Bitcoin to continue to make strides to become an accepted currency worldwide. The actual turnout of both will, however, depend future needs.