The crypto currency is the digital asset, which is being designed to work as a basic money exchange medium [3]. The crypto currency eventually uses a strong cryptographic algorithm to secure the various financial transactions and hence creating an additional unit is controlled and an asset transfer is easily verified. These crypto currencies can also be defined as the digital currency, alternative currency or virtual currency types. There are few decentralized controls for all crypto currencies and these specific crypto currencies work through the distributed ledger technology such as blockchain technology. The respective databases of all the public financial transactions are served with this blockchain technology. There are two important or vital examples of the crypto currencies are Bitcoin and Ethereum [8]. Both of these are digital currencies that are utilized worldwide for any type of virtual money transaction. The following report would be providing a brief description about the details related to Bitcoin and Ethereum. The architecture, features and challenges of Ethereum, the applications of Bitcoin with various differences and similarities will also be given here.

The crypto currency of Ethereum is a typical crypto currency, in which the blockchain could be generated by this platform of the Ethereum [12]. The Ether is easily transferred in the accounts of the users and hence the participant mining nodes are using for compensations of the computations that are performed eventually.

1. i) Architecture: The basic architecture of this Ethereum crypto currency is much different than any other crypto currency. The complete infrastructure of Ethereum then shares each and every record of transactional history. All the network nodes can store this transactional history and the most significant architecture factor is that these nodes are responsible for helping to store the current smart contract state, thus adding up the remaining ether transactions [7]. The basic network needs to be kept in the recent state and update it as per required. Moreover, the recent data of the applications are included in the user’s balance, codes of the smart contract and location to store the balance storage. The major purpose is to make future transactions and thus the Ethereum network is added with altered pieces and then is being classified as unspent and spent.

The above figure clearly depicts the respective architecture of the crypto currency of Ethereum. There are two instances present in the Ethereum DApp or Decentralized Applicaton [1]. Each comprises of a virtual machine, known as the EVM and then the contracts could be written in the smart contract specific programming languages. These programming languages compile the smart contracts to byte codes. EVM helps to read and execute the byte codes.

1. ii) Features: The most important characteristics or features of Ethereum crypto currency are given below:
2. a) Distributed Ledger: The first and the foremost feature of Ehereum is that it comprises of the respective open distributed ledger that is being utilized to record the various transactions within two parties efficiently although in a verified method [10]. The distributed ledgers are the shared and synchronized digital data, which is being stored in the centralized administrator.
3. b) Smart Contract: The second characteristic of the crypto currency of Ethereum is the presence of smart contracts. There is a specified platform that is eventually built to create the contracts and for this purpose, Ethereum allows the programming developers for easily functioning with the multi signature account [2]. Furthermore, these types of agreements could be controlled by the users and hence a perfect utility is being provided to all other contracts. The information about the applications such as domain registration information and membership records is solely stored here.
4. c) Presence of Cryptography: Another important feature of Ethereum is that the crypto currency is secured with the help of cryptography and hence with encryption, the security issues are easily eradicated and Ethereum becomes safer [5].
5. d) Decentralized Applications: Ethereum is a decentralized application, which runs on the decentralized networks with several trustless protocols. The single point of failure is properly avoided by this feature and few tokens are provided to the users for giving computing power [11]. Moreover, the data or records are easily stored here with blockchain technology.

iii) Challenges: In spite of having various advantages or features, few challenges are present for Ethereum and these are given below:

1. a) Higher Latency: The latency of Ethereum is very high and this often becomes an issue for the users [9].
2. b) Much Slow: Ethereum does not provide enough speed to the user and hence is often avoided.

The crypto currency of Bitcoin is the digitalized and decentralized currency that does not have any administrator. The network is peer to peer and thus the intermediaries are not included here. The security is extremely high for the Bitcoin [4]. The respective transactions could be verified by several network nodes and then these are recorded in the public distributed ledger, called the blockchain.

Various important applications are present for the Bitcoin and are collectively known as Crypto 2.0 or Bitcoin 2.0. These applications are being utilized worldwide and in several multinational organizations [6]. The two applications of Bitcoin for Token systems as well as Decentralized File Storage domains are given below:

1. i) Token Systems: The basic and the most significant application example of Bitcoin for the domain of token system is the Crypto Currency Token. This is an extremely and highly secured application of Bitcoin that comprises of zero complexity [8]. This particular token is the specific amount of the digital resources, which could easily managed by users. The Crypto Currency Token is then passed a Howey Test and only passing that test, this token is termed as secured. Another significant feature of this Crypto Currency Token is that it contains encrypted data and thus there is no chance of data theft or data loss. The need for the middle men is eliminated solely in this specific application of Bitcoin [1]. Furthermore, for removing the various complexities, the overall speed of Crypto Currency Token is incremented significantly.
2. ii) Decentralized File Storage: The significant application of the Bitcoin crypto currency in decentralized file storage domain is the Storj Coin or SCJX. It helps in decentralizing the financial transactions as well as the computing power [4]. The centralized entities are more liberal and localized within the system and this token is used by users to pay for storage of the nodes. This is extremely popular and vital application of the crypto currency of Bitcoin and thus the domain is being used by each and every user of Bitcoin.

1. i) Differences: The first and the foremost difference between the crypto currencies of Ethereum and Bitcoin is that the Bitcoin is being designed perfectly as the digital currency; whereas Ethereum is a general implementation of the technology of blockchain.The next difference is that the average time of block for Bitcoin is about 10 minutes, whereas in Ethereum the block time is less than 12 seconds [5]. About 65% of the total monetary supply of Bitcoin is already mined, whereas in Ethereum, the percentage is below 50%. The fourth difference within Ethereum and Bitcoin is that the Bitcoin is an alternate currency; whereas, ethereum can facilitate only P2P contracts and applications. The block limit of the Bitcoin crypto currency is less than 1 MB; whereas Ethereum does not comprise of block limit.
2. ii) Similarities: The first similarity is that both Ethereum and Bitcoin are the proper examples of the crypto currencies. Furthermore, these are systems of open block chain. The other similarity is that both of them sit on the P2P networks and all the users can easily view the transactions and then participating within the transactions [7]. Both Ethereum and Bitcoin are highly secured and this is another important similarity between them.

Architecture

Conclusion

Therefore, conclusion could be drawn that the crypto currencies are the digitalized currencies that use the significant technology of encryption to secure various processes that are involved in few transferred that are being conducted. These crypto currencies are the subsets of the digital currencies as there is lack of representation. Various famous examples of crypto currencies are present within the digitalized transactional world. Within these crypto currencies, the famous examples are Ethereum and Bitcoin. The protocol of Bitcoin can enable the P2P   or peer to peer exchange in the respective decentralized system that is not being linked with financial institution. The digital transactions are conducted by all the encrypted hash codes in the peer to peer networks. The users’ digitalized wallet helps in the maintenance of the two crypto currencies. The above report has properly described the several details regarding Bitcoin and Ethereum crypto currencies with relevant details. The applications, features and challenges are being analyzed for Ethereum and similarities and differences between them are provided in this report. Moreover, the two application examples of the token systems and decentralized file storages are also given here.

References

[1] Narayanan, Arvind, Joseph Bonneau, Edward Felten, Andrew Miller, and Steven Goldfeder. Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technologies: a comprehensive introduction. Princeton University Press, 2016.

[2] Delmolino, Kevin, Mitchell Arnett, Ahmed Kosba, Andrew Miller, and Elaine Shi. “Step by step towards creating a safe smart contract: Lessons and insights from a cryptocurrency lab.” In International Conference on Financial Cryptography and Data Security, pp. 79-94. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, 2016.

[3] King, Sunny. “Primecoin: Cryptocurrency with prime number proof-of-work.” July 7th (2013).

[4] Park, Sunoo, Krzysztof Pietrzak, Joël Alwen, Georg Fuchsbauer, and Peter Gazi. Spacecoin: A cryptocurrency based on proofs of space. Vol. 528. IACR Cryptology ePrint Archive 2015, 2015.

[5] Gandal, Neil, and Hanna Halaburda. “Competition in the cryptocurrency market.” (2014).

[6] Hayes, Adam S. “Cryptocurrency value formation: An empirical study leading to a cost of production model for valuing bitcoin.” Telematics and Informatics 34, no. 7 (2017): 1308-1321.

[7] Fry, John, and Eng-Tuck Cheah. “Negative bubbles and shocks in cryptocurrency markets.” International Review of Financial Analysis 47 (2016): 343-352.

[8] Gandal, Neil, and Hanna Halaburda. “Can we predict the winner in a market with network effects? Competition in cryptocurrency market.” Games 7, no. 3 (2016): 16.

[9] Scott, Brett. How can cryptocurrency and blockchain technology play a role in building social and solidarity finance?. No. 2016-1. UNRISD Working Paper, 2016.

[10] Abraham, Ittai, Dahlia Malkhi, Kartik Nayak, Ling Ren, and Alexander Spiegelman. “Solidus: An incentive-compatible cryptocurrency based on permissionless byzantine consensus.” CoRR, abs/1612.02916 (2016).

[11] Sompolinsky, Yonatan, Yoad Lewenberg, and Aviv Zohar. “SPECTRE: A Fast and Scalable Cryptocurrency Protocol.” IACR Cryptology ePrint Archive 2016 (2016): 1159.

[12] Iwamura, Mitsuru, Yukinobu Kitamura, Tsutomu Matsumoto, and Kenji Saito. “Can we stabilize the price of a Cryptocurrency?: Understanding the design of Bitcoin and its potential to compete with Central Bank money.” (2014).

The crypto currency is the digital asset, which is being designed to work as a basic money exchange medium [3]. The crypto currency eventually uses a strong cryptographic algorithm to secure the various financial transactions and hence creating an additional unit is controlled and an asset transfer is easily verified. These crypto currencies can also be defined as the digital currency, alternative currency or virtual currency types. There are few decentralized controls for all crypto currencies and these specific crypto currencies work through the distributed ledger technology such as blockchain technology. The respective databases of all the public financial transactions are served with this blockchain technology. There are two important or vital examples of the crypto currencies are Bitcoin and Ethereum [8]. Both of these are digital currencies that are utilized worldwide for any type of virtual money transaction. The following report would be providing a brief description about the details related to Bitcoin and Ethereum. The architecture, features and challenges of Ethereum, the applications of Bitcoin with various differences and similarities will also be given here.

The crypto currency of Ethereum is a typical crypto currency, in which the blockchain could be generated by this platform of the Ethereum [12]. The Ether is easily transferred in the accounts of the users and hence the participant mining nodes are using for compensations of the computations that are performed eventually.

1. i) Architecture: The basic architecture of this Ethereum crypto currency is much different than any other crypto currency. The complete infrastructure of Ethereum then shares each and every record of transactional history. All the network nodes can store this transactional history and the most significant architecture factor is that these nodes are responsible for helping to store the current smart contract state, thus adding up the remaining ether transactions [7]. The basic network needs to be kept in the recent state and update it as per required. Moreover, the recent data of the applications are included in the user’s balance, codes of the smart contract and location to store the balance storage. The major purpose is to make future transactions and thus the Ethereum network is added with altered pieces and then is being classified as unspent and spent.

The above figure clearly depicts the respective architecture of the crypto currency of Ethereum. There are two instances present in the Ethereum DApp or Decentralized Applicaton [1]. Each comprises of a virtual machine, known as the EVM and then the contracts could be written in the smart contract specific programming languages. These programming languages compile the smart contracts to byte codes. EVM helps to read and execute the byte codes.

1. ii) Features: The most important characteristics or features of Ethereum crypto currency are given below:
2. a) Distributed Ledger: The first and the foremost feature of Ehereum is that it comprises of the respective open distributed ledger that is being utilized to record the various transactions within two parties efficiently although in a verified method [10]. The distributed ledgers are the shared and synchronized digital data, which is being stored in the centralized administrator.
3. b) Smart Contract: The second characteristic of the crypto currency of Ethereum is the presence of smart contracts. There is a specified platform that is eventually built to create the contracts and for this purpose, Ethereum allows the programming developers for easily functioning with the multi signature account [2]. Furthermore, these types of agreements could be controlled by the users and hence a perfect utility is being provided to all other contracts. The information about the applications such as domain registration information and membership records is solely stored here.
4. c) Presence of Cryptography: Another important feature of Ethereum is that the crypto currency is secured with the help of cryptography and hence with encryption, the security issues are easily eradicated and Ethereum becomes safer [5].
5. d) Decentralized Applications: Ethereum is a decentralized application, which runs on the decentralized networks with several trustless protocols. The single point of failure is properly avoided by this feature and few tokens are provided to the users for giving computing power [11]. Moreover, the data or records are easily stored here with blockchain technology.

iii) Challenges: In spite of having various advantages or features, few challenges are present for Ethereum and these are given below:

1. a) Higher Latency: The latency of Ethereum is very high and this often becomes an issue for the users [9].
2. b) Much Slow: Ethereum does not provide enough speed to the user and hence is often avoided.

The crypto currency of Bitcoin is the digitalized and decentralized currency that does not have any administrator. The network is peer to peer and thus the intermediaries are not included here. The security is extremely high for the Bitcoin [4]. The respective transactions could be verified by several network nodes and then these are recorded in the public distributed ledger, called the blockchain.

Various important applications are present for the Bitcoin and are collectively known as Crypto 2.0 or Bitcoin 2.0. These applications are being utilized worldwide and in several multinational organizations [6]. The two applications of Bitcoin for Token systems as well as Decentralized File Storage domains are given below:

1. i) Token Systems: The basic and the most significant application example of Bitcoin for the domain of token system is the Crypto Currency Token. This is an extremely and highly secured application of Bitcoin that comprises of zero complexity [8]. This particular token is the specific amount of the digital resources, which could easily managed by users. The Crypto Currency Token is then passed a Howey Test and only passing that test, this token is termed as secured. Another significant feature of this Crypto Currency Token is that it contains encrypted data and thus there is no chance of data theft or data loss. The need for the middle men is eliminated solely in this specific application of Bitcoin [1]. Furthermore, for removing the various complexities, the overall speed of Crypto Currency Token is incremented significantly.
2. ii) Decentralized File Storage: The significant application of the Bitcoin crypto currency in decentralized file storage domain is the Storj Coin or SCJX. It helps in decentralizing the financial transactions as well as the computing power [4]. The centralized entities are more liberal and localized within the system and this token is used by users to pay for storage of the nodes. This is extremely popular and vital application of the crypto currency of Bitcoin and thus the domain is being used by each and every user of Bitcoin.

1. i) Differences: The first and the foremost difference between the crypto currencies of Ethereum and Bitcoin is that the Bitcoin is being designed perfectly as the digital currency; whereas Ethereum is a general implementation of the technology of blockchain.The next difference is that the average time of block for Bitcoin is about 10 minutes, whereas in Ethereum the block time is less than 12 seconds [5]. About 65% of the total monetary supply of Bitcoin is already mined, whereas in Ethereum, the percentage is below 50%. The fourth difference within Ethereum and Bitcoin is that the Bitcoin is an alternate currency; whereas, ethereum can facilitate only P2P contracts and applications. The block limit of the Bitcoin crypto currency is less than 1 MB; whereas Ethereum does not comprise of block limit.
2. ii) Similarities: The first similarity is that both Ethereum and Bitcoin are the proper examples of the crypto currencies. Furthermore, these are systems of open block chain. The other similarity is that both of them sit on the P2P networks and all the users can easily view the transactions and then participating within the transactions [7]. Both Ethereum and Bitcoin are highly secured and this is another important similarity between them.

Architecture

Conclusion

Therefore, conclusion could be drawn that the crypto currencies are the digitalized currencies that use the significant technology of encryption to secure various processes that are involved in few transferred that are being conducted. These crypto currencies are the subsets of the digital currencies as there is lack of representation. Various famous examples of crypto currencies are present within the digitalized transactional world. Within these crypto currencies, the famous examples are Ethereum and Bitcoin. The protocol of Bitcoin can enable the P2P   or peer to peer exchange in the respective decentralized system that is not being linked with financial institution. The digital transactions are conducted by all the encrypted hash codes in the peer to peer networks. The users’ digitalized wallet helps in the maintenance of the two crypto currencies. The above report has properly described the several details regarding Bitcoin and Ethereum crypto currencies with relevant details. The applications, features and challenges are being analyzed for Ethereum and similarities and differences between them are provided in this report. Moreover, the two application examples of the token systems and decentralized file storages are also given here.

References

[1] Narayanan, Arvind, Joseph Bonneau, Edward Felten, Andrew Miller, and Steven Goldfeder. Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technologies: a comprehensive introduction. Princeton University Press, 2016.

[2] Delmolino, Kevin, Mitchell Arnett, Ahmed Kosba, Andrew Miller, and Elaine Shi. “Step by step towards creating a safe smart contract: Lessons and insights from a cryptocurrency lab.” In International Conference on Financial Cryptography and Data Security, pp. 79-94. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg, 2016.

[3] King, Sunny. “Primecoin: Cryptocurrency with prime number proof-of-work.” July 7th (2013).

[4] Park, Sunoo, Krzysztof Pietrzak, Joël Alwen, Georg Fuchsbauer, and Peter Gazi. Spacecoin: A cryptocurrency based on proofs of space. Vol. 528. IACR Cryptology ePrint Archive 2015, 2015.

[5] Gandal, Neil, and Hanna Halaburda. “Competition in the cryptocurrency market.” (2014).

[6] Hayes, Adam S. “Cryptocurrency value formation: An empirical study leading to a cost of production model for valuing bitcoin.” Telematics and Informatics 34, no. 7 (2017): 1308-1321.

[7] Fry, John, and Eng-Tuck Cheah. “Negative bubbles and shocks in cryptocurrency markets.” International Review of Financial Analysis 47 (2016): 343-352.

[8] Gandal, Neil, and Hanna Halaburda. “Can we predict the winner in a market with network effects? Competition in cryptocurrency market.” Games 7, no. 3 (2016): 16.

[9] Scott, Brett. How can cryptocurrency and blockchain technology play a role in building social and solidarity finance?. No. 2016-1. UNRISD Working Paper, 2016.

[10] Abraham, Ittai, Dahlia Malkhi, Kartik Nayak, Ling Ren, and Alexander Spiegelman. “Solidus: An incentive-compatible cryptocurrency based on permissionless byzantine consensus.” CoRR, abs/1612.02916 (2016).

[11] Sompolinsky, Yonatan, Yoad Lewenberg, and Aviv Zohar. “SPECTRE: A Fast and Scalable Cryptocurrency Protocol.” IACR Cryptology ePrint Archive 2016 (2016): 1159.

[12] Iwamura, Mitsuru, Yukinobu Kitamura, Tsutomu Matsumoto, and Kenji Saito. “Can we stabilize the price of a Cryptocurrency?: Understanding the design of Bitcoin and its potential to compete with Central Bank money.” (2014).