Blockchain products  51

Cryptocurrency

We are already aware by now about cryptocurrencies and how they have

disrupted the financial market through blockchain technology. It all started

with one of the most successful use cases and the very first practical example

of blockchain technology called Bitcoin. At the time of writing this book,

the Bitcoin market capitalisation was $744 billion. There are about 6,000

cryptocurrencies being traded on exchanges as of the writing of this book,

and I believe there will be more influx of initial coin offering (ICO) and

cryptocurrencies in the crypto ecosystem.

Some of the examples of crypto by market capitalisation are listed in

Table 2.3.

Smart contract

The invention of the smart contract was one of the niche use cases of block-

chain technology. Ethereum invented the smart contract, and it is the only

blockchain that has it inbuilt along with its own cryptocurrency called

ETH. There are other blockchains as well within that you can develop

smart contracts in various languages and plug them inside the ecosystem

like R3 Corda, Hyperledger etc.

Table 2.2  Matrix of the use cases of successful products

Reference

Use case/product

Bitcoin

Ethereum Hyperledger

Ripple

R3

corda

A

Crypto Currency like

Bitcoin, Ether, Litecoin

Yes

Yes

No

Yes

No

B

Automation through

smart contracts like

insurance claim payout

No

Yes

Yes

No

Yes

C

Dynamic registry like

Fractional investing

No

Yes

Yes

No

Yes

D

Static registry like a land

registry

No

Yes

Yes

No

Yes

E

Payment infrastructure

like cross-border

payments

No

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

F

Identity

No

Yes

Yes

User

Yes

G

DiFi, NFTs (multiple use

cases)

No

Yes

No

No

No

H

Others (like ICO,

blockchain as a service)

Enabler

Enabler

Enabler

Enabler

Enabler