押注比特币热潮

map10401vhl

Betting on the Bitcoin BuzzBy NerdWallet, September 20, 2013, 02:38:08 PM EDT

原文地址：http://www.nasdaq.com/article/betting-on-the-bitcoin-buzz-cm279095

Betting on Bitcoins

Virtual currencies used to exchange goods on the Internet have been around for over a decade, but bitcoin is the one digital currency that’s proving its legitimacy in the real world with a current $1.5 billion evaluation and a possible ETF in the works thanks to venture capitalist twins, Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss.

押注比特币

互联网上出现可以易货的虚拟货币已经10多年了，但唯有比特币以其15亿的市值以及筹备中的可能的ETF（由风险投资行业的双胞胎梅伦•文克莱沃斯和泰勒•文克莱沃斯发起）证明了其合法性。

In the early days, you could buy a bitcoin for a tenth of a nickel, but these days it will cost you $135 to buy one. While bitcoin’s performance has been impressive year-to-date, there are risks associated with potential returns just like any other investment. Speculation is still high and regulation is pending, so consider the following pros and cons if you’re thinking of riding the bitcoin boom.

在比特的初期，你可以只用半分钱（美元）就买到一个比特币，但现在你需要135美元。虽然比特币从年初至今的表现令人印象深刻，但与其他投资一样，风险与潜在的收益并存。市场中投机依然盛行，监管则步履蹒跚。因此，如果你正在考虑要乘上比特币繁荣的大潮，下面这些正面与反面的因素是你需要考虑的。

Pros

Decentralization: Like gold, bitcoins are not tied to a government so they can’t be printed or manipulated by monetary policies. Since there’s only a finite amount of bitcoins—21 million by 2041 to be exact—they retain their value regardless of quantitative easing or interest rate policies.

优势：

去中心化：

与黄金一样，比特币与政府无关，因此既不会被政府随意滥发，也不会被政府的货币政策所操纵。鉴于比特币有限的总量——精确的说是到2041年总共两千一百万个——比特币会保持其价值而不受量化宽松或利率政策的影响。

Additionally, bitcoins are “minted” through preset intervals determined by an algorithm so that the supply grows at a regular, predictable rate without the interference of financial regulators like a central bank. Unsurprisingly, interest in bitcoins has come from countries that have had troubled economies including Argentina with its volatile currency woes and Zimbabwe with its hyperinflation challenges.

此外，比特币“铸造”的速度是通过事先设定的算法控制，因此其货币供给将按一个平稳的、可预测的速度增长，不受央行等金融监管机构的干预。毫不令人意外，那些经济陷于困境的国家的人们，往往对比特币有浓厚的兴趣——诸如面对汇率波动剧烈的阿根廷与深陷恶性通货膨胀津巴布韦。

No Third Parties: Bitcoins are not tied to any banking system and do not require a clearinghouse to settle transactions so there are virtually no fees or limits on how much you can send or accept. Bitcoins can be directly transferred person to person anywhere in the world within a matter of minutes through an online wallet service or a Bitcoin Wallet application that can be downloaded on a phone or computer. Bitcoins can also be converted into dollars, euros, yen, rupees and other currencies.

无第三方。

比特币与任何现有银行体系无关，也不需要清算机构来完成支付清算，因此比特币既没有支付手续费也没有支付金额限制。通过使用在线比特币钱包或者PC与手机上的比特币钱包客户端程序，任何一个人都可以在几分钟之内将比特币直接支付给世界上其他地方的任何一个人，同时比特币可以被兑换成美元、欧元、日元、卢比及其他货币。

Unlike banking transactions, bitcoins are transparent since every single transaction is verified and recorded in a real-time public ledger called the block chain. The block chain is maintained by a network of users who run it through a free Bitcoin mining software that solves complex cryptographic sequences to process and verify transactions and “mines” for new coins that are released into the system. Through this process, transactions are transparent but remain secure and anonymous.

与银行交易不同，比特币的每一笔交易都被验证并记录于一个被称为Blockchain的实时公共账簿，因此比特币是透明的。Blockchain被运行比特币网络的所有用户所持有，比特币网络上的用户通过运行免费的“挖矿软件”来维持比特币网络的运转，挖矿软件通过解决复杂的密码学问题来处理和验证交易、“铸造”新的比特币、并将比特币释放到网络之中。在整个过程中，交易是透明的，但同时保持了匿名性与安全性。

Strong Encryption: With military-level cryptography, bitcoins are hard to counterfeit. Every transaction requires a unique signature, or private key, that is verified by a miner and is permanently stored on the network. Through this process, every bitcoin has an associated history attached to it that makes it difficult to replicate or counterfeit.

强保密性
基于军用级的加密算法，比特币很难伪造，每一笔交易都需要一个唯一的被MINER验证过的签名（或者说“私钥”），同时每一笔交易都被保存于网络之中，通过这个过程，每个比特币上都附加了其之前所有交易历史，因此很难被复制或伪造。

CONS
Technological Vulnerabilities: As with physical money, you can easily lose virtual money. If you forget your password, don’t backup your hard drive or accidentally override and erase your Bitcoin wallet, you can easily lose all your bitcoins.
Bitcoins can also be stolen through malware, viruses and attacks. Owners of online wallet services have also disappeared with people’s bitcoins. To safeguard against these attacks as well as human error, you’ll need to set up and maintain a system of online and offline backups — which can be a hassle in and of itself.

劣势

技术脆弱性

与实体货币一样，虚拟货币也很容易丢失。如果你忘记你的密码、没有备份你的硬盘或偶然覆盖并擦除了你的比特币钱包，那么你将丢失你所有的比特币。比特币同样可能通过恶意软件、病毒以及网络攻击等手段被盗取，在线比特币钱包服务商也有可能弄丢你的比特币。为了防范这些攻击与人为失误，你需要建立并维持一整体套在线与离线的备份机制——这套机制本身可能就很麻烦。

Volatility: Bitcoins are not pegged to any currency which can cause it to fluctuate wildly. Since its inception in 2009, it has traded for less than a penny and reached a high of $220 last April. Additionally, the rates between the bigger exchanges and a local exchange can be vastly different.

波动性

比特币没有盯住任何一种货币，因此其波动可能很剧烈。在其诞生的2009年，比特币不值一分钱，而到了今年4月其价格已经高220美元。此外，较大型交易所的汇率与本地比特币交易所的汇率之间，也可能存在巨大差距。

Fraud: The anonymity of using bitcoins has also provided a way for criminal activity such as the buying of illegal goods or money laundering. And while regulation can be good for Bitcoin in order to prevent fraudulent activities, there’s no telling if governments will try to abolish virtual currencies altogether. Just last month the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, FinCEN, informed Bitcoin that it must adhere to U.S. financial rules.

欺诈

比特币的匿名性，为诸如买卖非法物品与洗钱之类犯罪活动提供了新的途径。虽然从防范欺诈活动角度，加强监管对比特币是有利的，但谁也无法保证政府不会干脆彻底取缔虚拟货币。就在上个月，美国财政部金融犯罪执法网络（FINCEN）就宣布比特币必须遵守美国金融法律法规。

Proceed With Caution
The most common ways to get bitcoins are to accept them as payment, mine for them which can require a lot of time and computing power, or purchase them directly which can be expensive. If you do decide to invest in them, be aware it can take a lot of time and resources, and you may want to start off with money you can afford to lose since the FDIC won't guarantee virtual currencies even if the risks are just as real as the returns.
Hannah Kim is a financial writer at NerdWallet, a site dedicated to helping consumers learn how to manage their money, whether it’s to help them find the best credit card for their needs, or find the right online brokerage account.

谨慎为之

获取比特币最通常的手段，是接受比特币付款，“铸造”比特币需要很多时间与计算机算力，直接购买则可能价格昂贵。如果你决定投资比特币，注意这可能需要耗费你很多时间和金钱，而且即便承担的风险与回报是一样真实的，但考虑到FDIC不会对虚拟货币提供保障，因此在一开始你最好将金额控制在你可接受损失的范围之内。

译者BTC捐助地址：1dTkTFEryEVQr7cPBtJapfk6HQAz8fmAo
PS：第一次翻译，文章内容没什么太多新鲜内容，主要是练手～ ：）