Cryptocurrency

A cryptocurrency, also called crypto, is digital money that is issued and transferred on a blockchain rather than by a bank or a government. Ownership is proved with cryptographic keys: whoever controls the private key controls the coins, and transactions are broadcast to a peer-to-peer network where nodes verify them against shared consensus rules. Bitcoin was the first widely used example, and thousands of others now exist, some meant as money, others as fuel for smart-contract platforms. Because settlement is final and there is usually no issuer able to reverse a payment, mistakes such as sending to a wrong address or losing a seed phrase are typically permanent. Most cryptocurrency prices move sharply and holding them carries a real risk of loss.