Cryptocurrencies: the future of money or just a speculative investment?
Piedade, João Silva · Repositório do ISCTE-IUL · 2018
Cryptocurrencies have been in vogue ever since Bitcoin first appeared in 2008. From that moment on, a new potential market started evolving and is nowadays a daily topic for everyone involved in the financial and monetary markets. Cryptocurrencies presented themselves as a viable alternative to traditional currencies, with a lot of new interesting features, but also several aspects that split the opinions between those who understand it as a great alternative for the future and the more skeptical ones who still question its legality and use. Nowadays, cryptocurrency is one of the most interesting topics in the financial markets due to all the controversy associated, as well as the public acceptance, responsible for the huge prices that these coins have been reaching. In this dissertation, we aim to analyze every aspect concerning cryptocurrencies. With the intention to clarify the most important details about this new market, all these details have been scrutinized, from the several different types of cryptocurrencies and its behavior, to the factors that have an impact in cryptocurrencies prices. Cryptocurrency is still a trendy and unknown subject to many people, and that was the motivation and the main objective of this dissertation, to clarify everyone about this topic before thinking of investing in any of these new cryptocurrencies.