What is Bitmark?
Bitmark (abbrev BTM) is a decentralized and peer2peer cryptocurrency forked from Bitcoin. The coin was created by a Taiwan based company referred to as Bitmark Inc. By the close of November 2018, the company was headed by Sean Moss-Pultz who also served as the CEO.
BTM is a proof of work (PoW) coin that employs scrypt hashing algorithm. Though it is a Bitcoin fork, Bitmark has 27.5 million coins while the former has 21 million. Other important parameters include a block time of 120 seconds and block reward of 20 BTM for every block. The block reward haves every three years as opposed to 4 years in Bitcoin network.
- A closer look at BTM performance in the market
When BTM was released into the market in August 2014, its value was $0.096. Then, it grew steadily to hit $0.77 by 22nd September 2014. Then, the value took a downward trend hitting a low of $0.024 by July 2015. The value remained within the range of $0.01 and $0.08 between July 2015 and July 2016 when it took a steady bullish trend.
By 24th September 2016, the value had grown to $0.4. In June 2017, the value of BTM broke through the $1 mark to hit a high of $1.62. After dropping to $0.4 by November 2017, the value started took an upward trend again and rose to $3.39 on January 6th, 2018. This was a huge growth of about 3400%. It was also the highest mark in the BTM history.
The good show recorded by the close of 2017 and early January 2018 did not last. Immediately after hitting the peak of 6th January 2018, the price took a steady downtrend and hit a low of $0.8 by the close of February 2018. But the drop did not stop there.
By mid-April, the value of BTM had dropped to $0.4 before going down further to $0.02 by October 2018. This is indeed lower than the starting mark of August 2014. If you target to invest in the coin, it is important to closely follow the price performance and compare it with other coins before buying the tokens.
What is the problem that Bitmark solves?
When Bitmark entered the market in 2014, the pioneer crypto networks were starting to experience major issues that threatened their success. Here are some of these issues that Bitmark solves.
- Poor adoption of cryptocurrencies in the market
If you take a closer look at the cryptocurrency niche, one could be tempted to think that everything is okay because of the long list of coins entering the market every year. For example, there were more than 1600 crypto coins in the market by the third quarter of 2018. However, the same growth is not reflected in people’s lifestyles.
If you have some coins and want to purchase an item downtown, only a few stores will be supporting it. The truth is that when a new coin is released into the market, the buyers who rush to purchase are investors who purchase in bulk. Then, they sell to others when the price goes up.
The target of Bitmark is making more people to join the niche and enjoy the benefits of decentralization. It targets to make crypto coins as effective as the fiat currencies in different areas ranging from shopping to investment.
- Centralization of financial services
The conventional financial services such as banks and credit card companies operate as completely centralized systems. Transactions are processed by staff or automated systems in centralized locations. For example, the workers in your bank have to look at all transactions before approving them. While this is the model preferred by governments, it comes with a number of issues.
One, the centralized system is an easy target for attackers. It can also be easily damaged by disasters such as fire or weather and cause huge losses.
Two, centralized systems can be a subject of mismanagement. By entrusting the management of clients’ funds to a few individuals, there is a risk of losing personal savings in the event of mismanagement that result in bankruptcy.
- The high cost of sending value
This is perhaps the most notable issue in most centralized financial systems. To raise the funds for paying staff, rent, and optimize profits, most banks opt to raise the cost of transactions. By passing this cost to customers, some of them are forced to only send lower amounts in order to meet the transaction costs.
Notably, people have been complaining that even with the high cost of sending money, they do not get the value they anticipated. For example, the transactions take long before they can be processed. In some cases, it can take up to four days before the recipient gets the coins
How does Bitmark solve the problem?
- Marking
Marking system was adopted in the Bitmark system to help users note traders who are trusted and those who are not. As more traders adopt the digital coins, some have started abusing the notion of anonymity. For example, since transactions are irreversible, some opt to send the wrong or substandard items to users.
The marking system is a system to help advance the use of BTM and other coins by marking such traders so that other users can easily note them. Traders with positive markings are trusted and, therefore, reliable top buy from. Do not risk your funds by purchasing from traders who cannot be trusted.
- Bitmark operates as a completely decentralized network
This is the main method that Bitmark uses to solve the above problems. Unlike the centralized financial organizations that store user data and run transactions from a centralized place, the Bitmark system is completely decentralized. This means that all transactions are run by nodes spread in the system.
When a user initiates a transaction, it is taken over by the miners on the platform. The nodes follow back the transaction initiator to confirm he has ample funds to use and prevent double spending. If everything is okay, they add the transactions to the next block and attach it to the public ledger.
Use of decentralized nodes implies that there is no centralized point of failure. The data and all transaction details are stored in different computers so that users are assured it will always be available no matter the time of the day or night. Even if one node is offline or falls off, the data will still be available from other nodes.
- Application of Scrypt algorithm
Scrypt mining algorithm is a memory-intensive hashing algorithm created to help advance the concept of even coin distribution. The idea was to lower efficiency of ASIC equipment so that more people could mine and use the native coins.
Though Scrypt was very effective when it was first deployed at Litecoin, the discovery of scrypt ASICs made it less effective. Top examples of the mining equipment include the Antminer L3+ and Bittech L1.
What makes Bitmark better than it’s competitors?
When Bitmark entered the market in 2014, the competition was not as severe as four years later when more than 1600 coins had entered the market. Therefore, the development team had to craft a winning strategy and progressively review it to remain competitive. Here are the things that male Bitmark better than competitors.
- The marking model used at Bitmark helps to put users in greater control of their digital operations compared to other coins in the market today.
- The platform allows users to join and own the network. When you become a node on the Bitmark system, you can send value, mine, and participate in its governance through voting.
- Birmark provides users with a reliable and secure way of sending value across the globe.
- The transactions on the platform are encrypted so that users can send value or invest without worrying about third-party seizures.
- The Bitmark network has been in operation since 2014. This implies that its features and structures have been tested and proven to work. The crypto community is always skeptical of new projects because it is difficult to tell whether the designs are pump and dump schemes.
How can Bitmark’s be categorized?
Bitmark is a completely decentralized and an ambitious project that seeks to empower users more by allowing them to mark enterprises and traders based on trust. The founders appreciated that even though the ideas of decentralization and anonymous operations are helping people to match to the next level faster, there is a danger of scammers hiding in the system.
Though the unique model did not help to push the price of the BTM up especially in 2018, it could ultimately turn out to be the stepping block for the crypto success. The team holds the view that people will be able to follow on the marks of different operators the way it happens in many e-commerce sites.
What is Bitmark’s vision on security?
The Bitmark’s vision on security is offering users a reliable and secure platform for sending value at the local and international level. The target is helping people to feel secure to invest their money in the coins and run transactions without worrying of attacks or losing their coins.
Here are the main methods used to keep the network secure:
- Advanced encryption
- The development team reviews the platform and releases new updates regularly to clear vulnerabilities
- Bitmark network is completely decentralized to facilitate even distribution of native coins to prevent the risk of 51% attack
Examples of Bitmark use cases/ applications
The primary goal of Bitmark of extending its use cases is manifested in multiple use cases. Here are the main use cases of the Bitmark.
- Bitmark can be used to send value on a peer2peer basis to any place across the globe. Unlike other financial providers such as banks that are centralized and take long before transactions can be completed, users on Bitmark can send value faster because both the sender and recipient are on the same network.
- The Bitmark native coins can be used to pay for goods and services in stores that support the coins. As more stores start supporting digital coins for direct payment, it is possible to make payments for products in a store downtown or e-commerce platforms using digital coins. Even in the event that a store only supports a different coin, it is still possible to complete payment by converting BTM to the accepted coin in an exchange that lists it.
- BTM can be used to trade in the exchanges that list them. Like other coins such as Bitcoin, you can trade BTM in exchanges such as Cryptopia and Bytex. Note that these markets require users to open trading accounts and verify them before they can start trading.
Note that when trading in the exchanges, you will be required to provide additional information about yourself before trading can begin. You need to be prepared for this because the encryption that guarantees privacy in the Bitmark system is absent in centralized exchanges.
- Bitmark can be used to pay for government services such as taxes and utility bills in jurisdictions that support cryptocurrencies such as Singapore and Arizona. Take the case of Arizona. In April 2018, Arizona passed HB 1094 that mandated the tax department to accept cryptocurrencies. If a resident pays tax in BTM, the coins are converted to USD and credited to his account.
- BTM is a reliable coin for saving and investing in cryptos. If you have interest in venturing into the cryptos, the first step is buying a potential coin such as BTM. The performance of BTM in the market has been impressive and the community is optimistic that the value will finally take an uptrend in the coming years.
It is important to appreciate that the expected positive growth is only speculative. There are many factors that come into play to determine the price trend of a coin. For example, the looming legislation in various countries such as Russia, the EU, and the US are expected to affect the crypto prices negatively. Therefore, it is advisable to only invest a small number of your native coins to avoid and closely follow the emerging trends.
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https://bitmark.com/assets/bitmark_technical-white-paper.pdf