Interesting point about Gold is that mysteriously it has got the ability to attract people around the globe as every civilization on the face of the earth used to accept Gold and they are accepting them till date.
This article is all about currencies being used on the face of the earth before Christ till date, both for transactions and precious holding. Currencies have evolved from barter system to Gold and silver coins and then these coins being represented by paper currency and now we are entering a new age of Digital Currency.
For an entity to be Currency/ Money it may have capability of having Durability in long run. So that if some one save a specific amount of money it may be equally rated and acceptable in the coming days as well. So this sort of currency could be hold as saving, example of this sort of money in near past was Gold. To efficiently compare digital Gold, we have to look back in the history to know exactly how Gold evolved from a metal to currency and then to a symbol of precious holding.
Gold in ancient times
Gold is known as first metal being used by the human beings most probably due to its softness and easy molding. In history it is known as early as 4000BC. However around 1500BC it was first used by the Egyptians as coin and medium of exchange with coin named 'Shekel'. Later in 50BC Romans used gold to issue their coin named 'Auresu' extracted from roman name of gold and Chemical symbol of Gold is also from this name 'Au'.
Gold is also referred in the holy scriptures of almost every religion. It is referred in Old Testament and New Testament of Christian holy books, it is also referred in Holy Book of Muslim i.e. Quran. So cut short Gold is mysterious obsession of our species.
Gold being currency
In late 1200AD British Government issued its First Gold coin named 'Florin', but across the Europe 'Ducat' of Republic of Florence gained fame and became on of the most popular coin in the history. Ducat dominated the currency market and remained on top till next five centuries.
Paper currency replica
With the increase in mobility of people across the continents made currency flow uncontrolled and flow of gold coins made shortage in some regions, aside from this clipping of gold coins i.e. to clip small piece of metal and melting them again to form a coin, Gold coins needed some better alternative. To address these problems in late 16 Centaury Paper money was introduced on the basis of specific amount of Gold. One could go to a bank and for a paper money he could claim specific amount of gold against that currency note. This was end of gold being direct currency.
Functions of a currency
Durability
Gold [YES]
Paper Money [YES]
Portability
Gold [NO]
Paper Money [YES]
Divisibility
Gold [NO]
Paper Money [YES]
Uniformity
Gold [YES]
Paper Money [YES]
Limited Supply
Gold [NO]
Paper Money [YES]
Acceptability
Gold [YES]
Paper Money [NO]
From above listed functions it is evident that Gold ceased to have 3 out of 6 currency functions and paper currency provided better alternates to most of these functions.
As paper money had replaced Gold and was actually based on Gold, So people got Gold as original currency and used it as precious holding that will always be worthy.
* Detail of above listed money functions are elaborated in detail here
Digital Gold
The currencies functions that Gold lacked as stated above, all Digital currency had solutions for two of the functions i.e. Portability and Limited Supply. But they were lacking in Acceptability. As soon as acceptability increased value of Digital currencies was also on the rise.
It is known fact how BTC evolved and had initially seemed to replace the fiat money by having most of the currency functions, but with the passage of time it became evident that lacking Divisibility in its nature restricted its function. However still BTC is most Worthy Digital Currency being replica of Gold in Digital Currencies as No one want to use it as currency but holding it as a precious holding.
Digital Currency
In this changing phase in the arena of currencies the dominance will be decided on the basis of same currency functions listed above. The Digital Currency that solved the problem of BTC i.e. Divisibility will have the upper hand and will dominate the arena.
Divisibility is basically the function of currency in which it is able to divided as small portion as needed. Digital currencies have Divisibility but its way much costly and cost of small payments is many fold higher than original amount, make it failed in this function of currency.
BCH has efficiently solved this problem of low cost transactions with better divisibility. BCH in comparison to BTC is quite undervalued due to the fact that it had limited acceptability in comparison with BTC but now it is getting pace. An International Fashion Brand BIRDINI has announced accepting BCH. This guy has urged @elonmusk to add BCH in payment methods to buy TESLA cars, he will be first to purchase 111 Tesla 3S.This sort of free birds are entering on daily basis and it will eventually make BCH the real Digital Currency as it already has mastered all the currency functions.
Final Word
Let me cut all the detail short for you, either you have gone through all the detail I have written down over there or you are here to see the final word, Let me show you the logos of both coins I was discussing in my article.
The Coin you see more like Gold Colored is Actually what I am trying to say is Digital Gold and the Coin in the Color of Nature is Naturally Digital Currency.
Have a look at following articles as well
https://read.cash/@engr.utman/dinosaur-of-digital-currency-6ff4461c
