The popularity of bitcoin has risen sharply ever since the open source digital currency platform was first introduced to the public. Many people don’t understand exactly what bitcoin is. Some people have a negative idea of what it is and some have a positive image in their mind of what it is. This is understandable. This nature of the currency is pretty cryptic. A lot of the general public has some concerns when it comes to the currency. Public opinion of bitcoin seems to be shifting recently. This idea has been backed up by a recent survey that was conducted in Germany.

The Survey

This survey was conducted by the German Central Bank itself. They conducted the survey as a means to ascertain what people’s trust levels are with bitcoin and other digital currency that they may have heard of. The survey did show that a growing number of German residents are growing to trust the currency as a means of making transactions. Bitcoin is not as unheard of as it once was.

Germany is not known for its friendly relationship with bitcoin. It was thought that most residents of the country were not familiar with it in any way at all. After the survey, it was revealed that 26% of residents of Germany had heard of bitcoin before. The strongest demographic when it came to bitcoin was people ages 18-24. 41% of the people in this age group had heard of bitcoin.

The German bank is not known to have to positive of a viewpoint towards alternate forms of currency. They are one of the leaders in the European Union when it comes to this. The European Union is comprised of most of the economically strong countries on the continent. One of the most important members, The United Kingdom, recently voted to leave the EU in a controversial vote. This is why the survey was surrounding with such skepticism.

Bitcoin

Bitcoin was first introduced by a Japanese software developer in 2008. No one knows for sure the actual identity of the man who invented the currency program. It is a P2P, open-source software. Open source means that it can be edited by anyone that has access to it. P2P simply means peer to peer. A peer to peer format ensures that two people can complete a transaction without having a third party or a middle man involved.

Security

There have also been some concerns over security when it comes to owning bitcoin. A few bitcoin holding companies have had their online wallets hacked. This has resulted in some huge losses for the companies and the investors in the currency. The most notable recent security breach of this time happened with Bitfinex. The company had about $70 million worth of bitcoin stolen. It is going to divide the losses up equally amongst its clients by subtracting a percentage from their portfolios. They will be reimbursed if the coins are found. The reward for information and the return of the coins is over $3 million dollars.

Youth

While this form of cryptocurrency is still a mystery to many older residents of Germany, it seems to be catching with the younger generations. It is important to understand that nobody under the age of 18 was consulted during this survey. The youngest demographic was the demographic that had the most knowledge about digital currency. This bodes well for the future of bitcoin as those that use it try to make it more popular on a worldwide basis.

Still Way Behind

While bitcoin is gaining in popularity, other more traditional forms of payment are still way ahead of it when it comes to how often they are used. The gap between the two does seem to be shrinking, though. Other forms of online transactions are still more popular than bitcoin, like Paypal. Bitcoin does have a 5% market share though when it comes to transactions. This is actually fairly impressive for the new form of digital currency.

While bitcoin does have a long way to go, the public perception of the cryptocurrency does seem to be trending in the positive direction. One of the most telling stats from the survey is that 42% of the people asked said that they would use bitcoin at some point in the future.