The future of cryptocurrencies

Last week two major conferences were hosted in New York City to discuss about digital currencies. Several U.S investors committed to increase investments in digital currencies, such as J.P Morgan who announced that they are working with Zcoin to increase the privacy protection for the settlement of transactions on a blockchain. Ethereum digital coin had a 2000% price increase overtaking the probably more famous Bitcoin. The past weekend, for the first time in its history, Bitcoin surpassed the 2000$ mark. The market capitalization of digital coins has reached 90 billion dollars during the past week due to increased trading volumes and traffic on Coinbase, one of the platforms where digital currencies are traded. This clearly shows that the demand for digital coins is growing dramatically. One of the strongest supporters of these cryptocurrencies is Fidelity CEO Abigail Johnson who promoted the initiative that clients could see their digital coins holdings on Coinbase on their Fidelity portal. She also allows Fidelity employees to pay for their lunch with Bitcoins. However, it is still doubtful that these cryptocurrencies will become the new norm? If we look at the past, cryptocurrencies have been declared dead at least 30 times, but they always managed to get back on track and become an attractive investment not only for tech-gurus, but also for large banks due to the safety related to these encrypted coins. However, their usability is still questionable and not even close to the most commonly used credit cards.