This book provides a comprehensive analysis of the cryptocurrency phenomenon from a financial/monetary point of view. It offers a unique slant in at least two ways, with the financial perspective as the reference point. An examination of the technicalities surrounding blockchain and the mining of cryptocurrencies is included, but the reading is oriented to those who seek to better understand how these technical issues help to explain the functioning and the potential of cryptocurrencies, without touching on coding aspects. Moreover, the book addresses cryptocurrencies as an evolution of the concept of money, and it frames the analysis to give readers all the knowledge needed to connect the cryptocurrency phenomenon with traditional monetary theories. In so doing, cryptocurrencies are not considered as a completely disconnected trend, set apart from traditional financial systems, but as innovations that will push the concept of money forward, without dismantling previous foundations.The book also includes a discussion on central banks, and stresses how their initial diffidence toward cryptocurrencies has turned into a more active approach that includes projects to develop the so-called Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDC), thereby completing the analysis of the state of the art of the cryptocurrency surge. The mix of theoretical content on the concept of money, the description of payment tools and the functioning of the payment industry, and the analysis of blockchain and the cryptocurrency markets makes the book interesting reading for researchers, scholars and students of economics, finance, or business, enabling them to develop the ability to understand the dynamics of the cryptocurrency phenomenon and its possible evolution.
