10 Things You Need to Know About Crypto
Published in
2 min readAug 30, 2022
- One in five Americans spend, save, borrow or invest cryptocurrency. But a 2022 survey from the Federal Reserve reports that people use it mostly for investment purposes.
- Over half of investors are new to the crypto market, with 55% of Bitcoin investors starting one year ago.
- Bitcoin debuted in 2008, making it one of the oldest cryptocurrencies in use today. Any other coin is called an altcoin (alternative coin to Bitcoin).
- The first recorded real-world cryptocurrency purchase was in 2010 for two pizzas. They cost 10,000 Bitcoin–which would be worth over $200 million today.
- In 2022, over 250 retailers and merchants accept cryptocurrency as a form of payment.
- Popular apps like CashApp and PayPal, or crypto exchanges like Coinbase and Crypto.com make it easy to buy and sell cryptocurrency. Crypto can be a part of traditional investment vehicles, like 401(k)s.
- The IRS categorizes cryptocurrency as property, subjecting taxpayers to capital gains tax on earnings and profits on sales and exchanges.
- The crypto industry is relatively new and not fully regulated yet. When buying or selling crypto, there is risk of potential loss from market fluctuations. It is important to do the proper research and only purchase an amount that could be lost forever.
- Rather than passing clear regulations to govern the crypto industry, the SEC has pursued “regulation by enforcement,” engaging in one-off lawsuits that have left the crypto industry in a regulatory gray area.
- Ideas for a regulatory framework are percolating in Congress. Earlier this year, Sens. Gillibrand and Lummis introduced legislation that would clearly define how digital assets are regulated. In the House, Democratic leaders are hard at work on stablecoin legislation.
