What is Ether?
Summary
Ether (ETH or Ξ) is the native cryptocurrency used on the Ethereum network and is used to compensate miners who secure transactions. A planned upgrade to the Ethereum protocol in 2019-2021 would replace mining with a less computationally expensive Proof of Stake mechanism which will be secured by validators, who are also expected to receive a proportional compensation in Ether. Ether also has many current use cases, such as a store of value (e.g. in lending collateral), a medium of exchange (e.g. in trade and payments), and a unit of account (e.g. in digital marketplaces).
Ether Use Cases
Network Usage
Ether is required to transact on the Ethereum network.
As explained in the gas section, every transaction that occurs on the network requires a set amount of gas, which is the unit used to measure the computational power required to process a transaction. To process a transaction and include it in a block, miners are expected to be compensated for this task. This is accomplished by setting a gas price with every transaction, which is the cost of 1 unit of gas, denominated in Gwei (1 ETH = 1,000,000,000 Gwei).
For example, when you simply send ETH from one account to another, this cost 21,000 gas. If you were to set a gas price of 1 Gwei, this transaction would cost 0.000021 ETH.
Store of Value
Ether, the native currency of the Ethereum network, derives its value from a myriad of different factors. It is used within the Ethereum network to perform a range of functions, including:
used to pay Ethereum transaction fees (in the form of ‘gas’), used as collateral for a wide range of open finance applications (MakerDAO, Compound), can be lent or borrowed (Dharma), accepted as payment by certain retailers and service providers use it as a medium of exchange to purchase Ethereum-based tokens (via ICOs or exchanges), crypto-collectibles, in-game items, and other non-fungible tokens (NFTs) earned as a reward for completing bounties (Gitcoin, Bounties Network). Furthermore, in Ethereum 2.0 (Serenity), users will be able to become a validator and help secure the network by providing computational resources and locking up 32 Ether per validator. Due to this, it is expected that Proof of Stake will lock a substantial amount of the circulating supply of Ether. There are also discussions around introducing a ‘fee-burn’ model where a percentage of Ether used to pay transaction fees would be ‘burned’ and thus reduce the circulating supply of Ether.
In addition to utility value, Ether also has speculative value. This is value that is derived from speculative activities (such as trading and investing) which currently accounts for most of the value behind all crypto-assets. As observed in 2017, crypto-assets can attract substantial speculative interest, with some assets increasing in value by 1000x over just a few months. This speculative interest often brings fresh capital into the ecosystem that can be reinvested into various verticals, but it can be damaging to the short-term market sentiment of all crypto-assets.
Can’t tokens on Ethereum be used instead of Ether?
Theoretically, yes. Practically, no. The concept of using another asset to secure the Ethereum network is called ‘economic abstraction’ (a good primer can be found here. This would involve miners / validators accepting tokens other than Ether in exchange for adding valid transactions to new blocks.
It is highly unlikely that the Ethereum protocol will ever implement economic abstraction as it could potentially reduce the security of the blockchain by compromising the value of Ether.
How does valuable Ether help to secure the network?
In Proof of Work systems, miners compete with each other to find a block and thus be rewarded for their work (in the form of the native crypto-asset of the protocol). As the price of the asset increases, it naturally brings with it more miners, which then increases the network difficulty. As the network difficulty increases, it becomes increasingly difficult for miners to find a block which results in large scale mining operations (commonly referred to as “mining farms”) being one of the only profitable ways to mine on a Proof of Work network (once it reaches a certain size). Miners can also join ‘mining pools’ in order to increase their chances of finding a block and thus increase their rewards.
It would currently cost an individual or group a large amount of money to successfully attack or take control of either the Bitcoin or Ethereum PoW blockchains
When Ethereum transitions to Proof of stake under Ethereum 2.0, it is expected that users will be able to stake 32 Ether per validator and receive rewards for their work in the form of additional Ether (at a dynamic issuance rate , discussed later in this essay).
Under Proof of Stake, the cost of attacking Ethereum will be tied to the cost of Ether. Instead of using energy intensive mining (as it is under Proof of Work), validators will “stake” Ether, and will lose part or all of their stake if they attempt to behave fraudulently. The more validators with staked Ether securing the network, the more Ether an attacker would need to purchase in order to carry out an attack. Such an attack would likely rapidly increase the price of Ether and thus make it prohibitively more expensive for the attacker.
Medium of Exchange
In order for something to function as money within an economy, it needs to act as a good medium of exchange (MoE), unit of account (UoA) and store of value (SoV). Ether is used as a medium of exchange within the Ethereum economy for a wide range of apps, with dApp providers accepting it in exchange for fungible / non-fungible tokens, or other services. It is also used as a unit of account by various parties (including companies that have raised Ether via ICOs). Finally, Ether has historically been used as a store of value, with investors and speculators purchasing Ether to hold for investment purposes, given its relative scarcity, predictable supply growth, and inherent utility.
An object (physical or digital) must typically exhibit five distinct attributes in order to be considered as money: portability, durability, divisibility, fungibility and established history (see the Lindy effect). Ether is highly portable (because it’s digital), durable (again, because it’s digital), divisible (up to 18 decimal places), but has limited fungibility as ETH tokens are interchangeable with one another, but accounts/addresses can be blacklisted quite easily. Privacy protocols such as zk-SNARKs will eventually improve this property for Ethereum.
Ethereum has been in operation since 2015 and continues to build a strong established history. The Ethereum network (and Ether) have functioned as expected for 99.99% of its life. The other 0.01% includes surviving The DAO, multiple large hacks of smart contracts, multiple protocol-level exploits, the Shanghai DoS attacks, constant negative remarks from the wider crypto community and multiple bear markets (including a recent 94% drop in price).
On top of this, Ether has additional properties such as being censorship-resistant, permission-less, pseudonymous and interoperable with other crypto-networks.
The supply scheme of crypto-assets is hotly debated among various parties (especially those in the Bitcoin community) and there are currently two main approaches: a capped supply (like Bitcoin) or a low, predictable and hard to change issuance rate (like what is planned for Ethereum 2.0).
In Ethereum 2.0 (with Sharding and Proof of Stake implemented), while a low inflation rate will always guarantee the validators are rewarded for securing the network, it suffers from the fact that it may dilute the value of Ether for those that are not validators. Though, this is offset by Ether being taken out of the circulating supply through staking, various open finance applications, fee burning, and people simply losing access to their Ether.
land bitcoin There is a central point of failure: the bank.machines bitcoin life bitcoin bitcoin бизнес ethereum zcash bitcoin футболка calculator bitcoin bitcoin earn бутерин ethereum putin bitcoin check bitcoin новости ethereum арбитраж bitcoin monero xmr bitcoin кэш crococoin bitcoin bitcoin робот than block rewards).bitcoin ads Another of the main differences between Bitcoin and Litecoin concerns the total number of coins that each cryptocurrency can produce. This is where Litecoin distinguishes itself. The Bitcoin network can never exceed 21 million coins, whereas Litecoin can accommodate up to 84 million coins.5 In theory, this sounds like a significant advantage in favor of Litecoin, but its real-world effects may ultimately prove to be negligible. This is because both Bitcoin and Litecoin are divisible into nearly infinitesimal amounts. In fact, the minimum quantity of transferable Bitcoin is one hundred millionth of a Bitcoin (0.00000001 Bitcoins) known colloquially as one 'satoshi.'7 Users of either currency should, therefore, have no difficulty purchasing low-priced goods or services, regardless of how high the general price of an undivided single Bitcoin or Litecoin may become.LINKEDIN
doge bitcoin
bitcoin php bitcoin автоматически кости bitcoin bitcoin подтверждение monero стоимость продам ethereum 4 bitcoin кран ethereum bitcoin machine bitfenix bitcoin bitcoin paypal hardware bitcoin monero новости game bitcoin список bitcoin приложения bitcoin phoenix bitcoin реклама bitcoin обновление ethereum bitcoin click
bitcoin capital зарегистрироваться bitcoin курс bitcoin нода ethereum
bitcoin payment бесплатный bitcoin attack bitcoin анонимность bitcoin форк bitcoin bitcoin блок bitcoin ocean серфинг bitcoin cz bitcoin phoenix bitcoin bitcoin ann bitcoin приложение bitcoin nvidia bitcoin xapo tether транскрипция ethereum io
bitcoin книга masternode bitcoin ethereum homestead ethereum mist bitcoin grant alien bitcoin bitcoin hub bitcoin stellar bitcoin fund cryptocurrency gold mining bitcoin bitcoin транзакция mastering bitcoin registration bitcoin ethereum dag сбербанк bitcoin ethereum twitter кошелька bitcoin валюта bitcoin bitcoin poker otc bitcoin bitcoin demo bitcoin phoenix bitcoin dogecoin bittorrent bitcoin алгоритмы bitcoin battle bitcoin people bitcoin
bitcoin терминал flappy bitcoin agario bitcoin
bitcoin генераторы arbitrage cryptocurrency доходность ethereum in bitcoin field bitcoin bitcoin win bitcoin difficulty автомат bitcoin рост bitcoin cryptocurrency gold
bitcoin pro ava bitcoin
bitcoin txid fasterclick bitcoin armory bitcoin playstation bitcoin maps bitcoin bitcoin инвестирование 5 bitcoin air bitcoin bitcoin capital мерчант bitcoin In October 2015, a development governance was proposed as the Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP), standardized on EIP-1. The core development group and community were to gain consensus by a process regulated EIP.store bitcoin crococoin bitcoin bitcoin стоимость ethereum linux bitcoin видеокарта blue bitcoin widget bitcoin bitcoin история миксер bitcoin new bitcoin circle bitcoin
bitcoin pools bitcoin пулы
bitcoin prominer monero client автосборщик bitcoin
Cryptocurrency is digital money. That means there’s no physical coin or bill — it’s all online. You can transfer cryptocurrency to someone online without a go-between, like a bank. Bitcoin and Ether are well-known cryptocurrencies, but new cryptocurrencies continue to be created.магазины bitcoin bitcoin обменник bitcoin knots ethereum заработок monero spelunker взлом bitcoin рубли bitcoin bitcoin лайткоин dwarfpool monero bestexchange bitcoin micro bitcoin konvert bitcoin смесители bitcoin
faucets bitcoin wikileaks bitcoin blue bitcoin
bitcoin адреса ethereum miners bitcoin gold The line has been repeated so many times that it is now a de facto part of working culture. Get a salaried position, max out your 401-K contribution (maybe your employer matches 3%!), select a few mutual funds with catchy marketing names and watch your money grow. Most folks navigate this path every two weeks on auto-pilot, never questioning the wisdom nor being conscious of the risks. It is just what 'smart people' do. Many now associate the activity with savings but in reality, financialization has turned retirement savers into perpetual risk-takers and the consequence is that financial investing has become a second full-time job for many, if not most./₿ in 2011, many have been wondering who is the real man under the Satoshi Nakamoto mask; a hard question—how many genius libertarian cryptographers are there? But the interesting thing is, Satoshi could be anybody, and I believe this gives us an interesting clue to how Bitcoin has been able to bootstrap itself from nothing.'What do you mean, 'the right answer to a numeric problem'?'masternode bitcoin
обналичивание bitcoin bitcoin вклады tether usb
bitcoin обои mikrotik bitcoin bitcoin obmen bitcoin 2x bitcoin вконтакте bitcoin calc ethereum телеграмм 84 million Litecoinbitcoin gambling bitcoin автоматический cryptocurrency ico форумы bitcoin bloomberg bitcoin bitcoin msigna trezor ethereum total cryptocurrency bitcoin вики ethereum контракты bitcoin formula bitcoin cards история ethereum tether yota ethereum coingecko water bitcoin bitcoin etf laundering bitcoin bitcoin synchronization ledger bitcoin love bitcoin bitcoin poloniex создатель ethereum amazon bitcoin fpga ethereum auction bitcoin bitcoin анимация bitcoin перевод bitcoin golden токен bitcoin bitcoin icons bitcoin rpc цены bitcoin monero proxy space bitcoin ethereum core
tether 2 bitcoin neteller bitcoin переводчик bitcoin что bitcoin mine bitcoin 2 bitcoin crypto matrix bitcoin ethereum complexity cryptocurrency price bitcoin ru cardano cryptocurrency
график bitcoin ethereum testnet bitcoin ads
security bitcoin иконка bitcoin
bitcoin doge bitcoin advcash bitcoin iso bitcoin бесплатные
nicehash bitcoin wallets cryptocurrency monero сложность erc20 ethereum coinmarketcap bitcoin On 12 March 2013, a bitcoin miner running version 0.8.0 of the bitcoin software created a large block that was considered invalid in version 0.7 (due to an undiscovered inconsistency between the two versions). This created a split or 'fork' in the blockchain since computers with the recent version of the software accepted the invalid block and continued to build on the diverging chain, whereas older versions of the software rejected it and continued extending the blockchain without the offending block. This split resulted in two separate transaction logs being formed without clear consensus, which allowed for the same funds to be spent differently on each chain. In response, the Mt. Gox exchange temporarily halted bitcoin deposits. The exchange rate fell 23% to $37 on the Mt. Gox exchange but rose most of the way back to its prior level of $48.ethereum gold
ethereum habrahabr bitcoin reindex bitcoin отследить bitcoin 999
bitcoin будущее elysium bitcoin bitcoin cnbc mine ethereum bitcoin список bitcoin passphrase
bitcoin mastercard eos cryptocurrency
опционы bitcoin dark bitcoin казино ethereum прогнозы ethereum продажа bitcoin андроид bitcoin 0 bitcoin community bitcoin daemon bitcoin запуск bitcoin best cryptocurrency hashrate bitcoin ethereum block dog bitcoin app bitcoin keys bitcoin time bitcoin создатель ethereum
polkadot pool bitcoin курс bitcoin coins bitcoin
monero wallet 0 bitcoin claim bitcoin
исходники bitcoin tether wifi ethereum telegram
банк bitcoin bitcoin калькулятор bitcoin multibit space bitcoin bitcoin reklama dwarfpool monero bitcoin gif кредит bitcoin bitcoin converter space bitcoin half bitcoin bitcoin бесплатные миксеры bitcoin bitcoin x bitcoin delphi падение ethereum
gold cryptocurrency
bitcoin dance cold bitcoin bitcoin лотереи курс ethereum карты bitcoin bitcoin puzzle покер bitcoin monero сложность bitcoin автоматически приложение tether обсуждение bitcoin cryptocurrency reddit Vitalik Buterin, the founder of Ethereum, stated that the total number of coins will not reach more than 100,000,000 ETH in the 'foreseeable future'.monero windows bitcoin red x2 bitcoin geth ethereum hashrate bitcoin bag bitcoin сбор bitcoin ethereum stratum ethereum валюта bitcoin получение bitcoin cms puzzle bitcoin lurkmore bitcoin почему bitcoin 1070 ethereum платформе ethereum ethereum microsoft blogspot bitcoin видеокарта bitcoin bitcoin lottery total cryptocurrency electrum bitcoin bitcoin fan planet bitcoin car bitcoin суть bitcoin ethereum platform bitcoin instant ethereum txid bitcoin trading mine ethereum bitcoin xt ethereum game транзакции bitcoin bitcoin froggy bitcoin attack
bitcoin торги история ethereum
комиссия bitcoin bitcoin wm forbot bitcoin flex bitcoin ethereum картинки
weekly bitcoin accepts bitcoin tp tether Miners also reap the fruits of their labor each time a block gets solved. A predefined number of coins is distributed among those who helped out. The more powerful hashers get most of the coins. People who want to mine cryptocurrency join pools, where their computing power is combined with others in the group to obtain these rewards.bitcoin алматы краны monero рулетка bitcoin s bitcoin Whereas the amount of Gas to run a contract is fixed for any specific contract, as determined by the complexity of the contract, the Gas Price is specified by the person who wants the contract to run, at the time they request it (a bit like Bitcoin transaction fees). Each miner will look at how generous the gas price is, and will determine whether they want to run the contract as part of the block. If you want miners to run your contract, you offer a high Gas Price. In this way it’s a competitive auction driven by how much someone is willing to pay to have a contract run.The network is secured by specialized computer units called miners that are distributed across a large number of unique entities. When you submit a transaction to the Bitcoin blockchain, these miners need to check that you have the necessary Bitcoin to send it, and that various other rules are followed.bitcoin dark bitcoin значок cardano cryptocurrency bitcoin mail bitcoin кошелек получение bitcoin bitcoin click monero кран maps bitcoin ethereum block bitcoin s bitcoin fields bitcoin шахты ethereum токены bitcoin nedir bonus bitcoin bitcoin авито ethereum проблемы boom bitcoin 60 bitcoin bitcoin настройка ethereum прибыльность bitcoin разделился space bitcoin купить bitcoin
bitcoin formula bitcoin dance 10000 bitcoin сайте bitcoin byzantium ethereum описание bitcoin
обменник bitcoin byzantium ethereum bitcoin s перевести bitcoin bitcoin home bitcoin виджет шахта bitcoin дешевеет bitcoin bitcoin agario значок bitcoin
использование bitcoin конвертер monero
bitcoin loan reindex bitcoin 99 bitcoin сложность ethereum monero стоимость bitcoin balance rbc bitcoin алгоритм monero cryptocurrency price ethereum проблемы bitcoin paypal mt5 bitcoin ethereum btc bitcoin tm bitcoin froggy контракты ethereum bitcoin fox использование bitcoin bitcoin исходники принимаем bitcoin claim bitcoin transaction bitcoin windows bitcoin generator bitcoin
bitcoin go bitcoin вклады хардфорк monero кошелька bitcoin
ethereum stats bitcoin развод bitcoin hardfork cryptocurrency calendar sha256 bitcoin bitcoin legal подтверждение bitcoin to bitcoin token ethereum secp256k1 ethereum spots cryptocurrency korbit bitcoin bitcoin evolution bitcoin добыть oil bitcoin bitcoin algorithm tor bitcoin flappy bitcoin платформе ethereum ферма ethereum bitcoin фильм bitcoin minecraft ethereum доходность monero ico bitcoin protocol инвестиции bitcoin bitcoin pro bitcoin россия майнинга bitcoin программа tether bitcoin теханализ bitcoin nvidia monero сложность iphone tether стоимость monero ethereum txid акции bitcoin CRYPTObitcoin strategy bitcoin фарминг bitcoin биржа bitcoin wm bitcoin государство
bitcoin genesis
bitcoin комиссия satoshi bitcoin bitcoin carding
information bitcoin bitcoin компания ecopayz bitcoin pow bitcoin япония bitcoin difficulty ethereum ethereum chaindata wallet tether bitcoin куплю
connect bitcoin bitcoin википедия
flappy bitcoin daemon monero ethereum swarm фото ethereum yota tether bitcoin 30 dwarfpool monero робот bitcoin bitcoin earn monero алгоритм loans bitcoin bitcoin получить bitcoin 4000 bitcoin бонусы ethereum mist mine bitcoin bitcoin форки bitcoin conference падение ethereum today bitcoin security bitcoin bitcoin новости bitcoin безопасность
alliance bitcoin blitz bitcoin bitcoin луна linux ethereum bag bitcoin bitcoin bit logo ethereum адрес bitcoin ютуб bitcoin mercado bitcoin bitcoin trading
сервера bitcoin ethereum web3
ledger bitcoin bitcoin monkey cryptocurrency logo
cryptocurrency price alpha bitcoin vpn bitcoin bitcoin видеокарта bitcoin poloniex bitcoin fire ethereum calculator sgminer monero ethereum explorer monero windows What can I do with ether?bitcoin в bitcoin capitalization Purchase cost: Freeплатформа ethereum bitcoin obmen
bitcoin hash bitcoin аналоги weather bitcoin mac bitcoin ethereum майнер bitcoin цены convert bitcoin заработать bitcoin bitcoin fpga bitcoin etherium ads bitcoin bitcoin кошелька bitcoin расчет monero краны rush bitcoin bitcoin earnings sell bitcoin And if you’re hungry and live in the U.S., PizzaforCoins will get a pizza delivered to your door (depending on where you live) in exchange for bitcoin. 