Full review of Bitcoin Gold (BTG): cryptocurrency prospects, best mining methods

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Bitcoin Gold (BTG) is a digital currency that emerged as a result of a hard fork of the Bitcoin network. The ideological inspirer of the new coin is an entrepreneur from Hong Kong, head of LightingASIC Jack Liao. The goal stated by the BTG developers is to replace the original Bitcoin and become the main digital gold. The main principle by which they want to achieve this is the decentralization of mining.


The development of the project will make this coin an improved decentralized analogue of Bitcoin.

Bitcoin Gold BTG. Bitcoin fork using the Equihash algorithm

Today, the Bitcoin Gold (BTG) cryptocurrency will be presented to your attention, which will primarily be of interest to miners. Nowadays it is very difficult to mine the original BTC and even BCH; Successful mining requires serious computing power, which only the largest mining pools and the largest mining farms in the world have.

The algorithm allows you to mine BTG more efficiently using regular GPU video cards, rather than expensive ASIC chips, and get greater profits at lower costs.

It is for this feature that we decided to analyze the Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency in today’s article. From it you can learn the history of the creation of the coin, how the BTG system is built, how Bitcoin Gold is mined; what are the advantages of this digital currency, who is its creator, who is on the development team, how to buy and store the coin, as well as what prospects does BTG have for the next few years and is it worth buying now.

What is Bitcoin Gold. BTG price and total capitalization

At the beginning of October 2022, the BTG coin ranks 23rd in the ranking of the best cryptocurrencies. The currency capitalization is 431,104,025 US dollars, the daily trading volume reaches 15,017,887 US dollars.

A total of 21,000,000 BTG will be issued, the number of coins in circulation is 17,267,036 BTG at the moment.

  • Coin ticker: BTG
  • Bitcoin Gold official website: https://bitcoingold.org/
  • Discussions on the Bitcointalk.org forum: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2284289.0
  • Telegram messenger channel: https://t.me/BitcoinGoldHQ
  • Open source system on GitHub: https://github.com/BTCGPU/BTCGPU
  • Bitcoin Gold official Twitter: https://twitter.com/bitcoingold

Average prices table

  • by month
  • by days
  • on years
MonthPrice, USD
January 202237.845
December 202143.235
November 202162.57
October 202168.075
September 202166.005
August 202163.83
July 202144.785
June 202154.0675
May 202191.985
April 202189.3375
March 202131.025
February 202123.427500000000002
January 202110.965
datePrice, USD
13.01.202237.045
12.01.202237.285
11.01.202236.63
10.01.202234.81
09.01.202236.09
08.01.202236.745000000000005
07.01.202237.845
06.01.202238.745000000000005
05.01.202239.7
04.01.202241.265
03.01.202242.015
02.01.202241.935
01.01.202241.625
31.12.202140.055
30.12.202140.955
29.12.202140.825
28.12.202141.925
27.12.202145.975
26.12.202145.36
25.12.202145.06
24.12.202145.805
23.12.202145.16
22.12.202142.54
21.12.202142.855000000000004
20.12.202143.235
19.12.202140.58
18.12.202141.075
17.12.202140.0
16.12.202141.465
15.12.202141.845
14.12.202143.185
13.12.202141.075
12.12.202144.599999999999994
11.12.202145.150000000000006
10.12.202144.595
09.12.202143.075
08.12.202146.22
07.12.202146.455
06.12.202146.885000000000005
05.12.202144.095
04.12.202141.83
03.12.202151.865
02.12.202154.205
01.12.202155.455
30.11.202155.325
29.11.202156.019999999999996
28.11.202155.87
27.11.202154.61
26.11.202152.82
25.11.202159.94
24.11.202156.459999999999994
23.11.202157.57
22.11.202156.47
21.11.202158.905
20.11.202160.25
19.11.202158.66
18.11.202157.215
17.11.202161.275
16.11.202160.739999999999995
15.11.202164.6
14.11.202167.9
13.11.202165.505
12.11.202165.44
11.11.202166.96000000000001
10.11.202170.15
09.11.202171.19
08.11.202170.35
07.11.202164.82499999999999
06.11.202163.865
05.11.202164.07
04.11.202164.395
03.11.202165.75999999999999
02.11.202166.33
01.11.202164.255
31.10.202164.23
30.10.202164.215
29.10.202165.525
28.10.202163.885
27.10.202161.67999999999999
26.10.202166.375
25.10.202168.89500000000001
24.10.202167.315
23.10.202168.455
22.10.202167.49000000000001
21.10.202168.075
20.10.202170.805
19.10.202170.005
18.10.202169.73
17.10.202169.12
16.10.202169.735
15.10.202174.27
14.10.202168.43
13.10.202169.76
12.10.202169.985
11.10.202171.7
10.10.202167.61
09.10.202168.35499999999999
08.10.202167.03
07.10.202171.495
06.10.202171.37
05.10.202161.99
04.10.202159.155
03.10.202158.795
02.10.202157.92
01.10.202156.905
30.09.202151.565
29.09.202150.615
28.09.202149.865
27.09.202150.5
26.09.202152.879999999999995
25.09.202153.42
24.09.202152.790000000000006
23.09.202157.08
22.09.202154.125
21.09.202152.375
20.09.202155.675
19.09.202164.525
18.09.202166.765
17.09.202166.07499999999999
16.09.202169.33000000000001
15.09.202168.275
14.09.202166.545
13.09.202165.035
12.09.202167.65
11.09.202164.925
10.09.202165.935
09.09.202168.565
08.09.202167.775
07.09.202169.63
06.09.202184.705
05.09.202185.445
04.09.202185.435
03.09.202183.605
02.09.202178.60499999999999
01.09.202178.315
31.08.202176.63
30.08.202176.955
29.08.202185.02000000000001
28.08.202173.815
27.08.202167.42
26.08.202165.38
25.08.202171.14500000000001
24.08.202167.765
23.08.202172.745
22.08.202172.33000000000001
21.08.202174.44999999999999
20.08.202169.935
19.08.202163.83
18.08.202160.765
17.08.202164.86
Data is provided for the dates on which the auction took place. Therefore, there is no data for weekends and holidays.
The table is too large to display on the screen.
YearPrice, USD
202237.845
202154.125
20209.067250000000001
201912.705
201830.445
2017247.0575

History of the creation of cryptocurrency

The official origin of the Bitcoin Gold coin is considered to be 2017. The founder of the new fork is Jack Liao, the creator of the famous Lightning ASIC corporation. He is also a major owner of mining farms located in Hong Kong.

The main reason why Jack Liao decided to create Bitcoin Gold was to improve the protocol of the original BTC in order to greatly simplify the process of mining cryptocurrency. Jack understood that the difficulty of mining BTC and all other currencies would increase over time, thus only the largest pools and mining corporations would be able to actively mine digital assets. The rest will take only a small part in this process.

It was on solving this problem that Jack Liao concentrated. Thus, the Equihash algorithm was introduced into BTG.

The press release of this blockchain project was in July, and already on October 25, a division occurred on block 491407 of the Bitcoin blockchain. In November, the BTG network was already functioning properly. It was on the 1st of this month that all users who had a positive BTC balance were able to receive a new coin for free, as a result of the Bitcoin fork.

The first day of trading for the new Bitcoin fork was unforgettable - the official website of the cryptocurrency faced a powerful DDoS attack. The developers, of course, dealt with this problem, but the situation itself left an unpleasant mark on the reputation of this company.

And even despite this situation, Bitcoin Gold almost immediately gained popularity in the market and began to grow exponentially until the deep correction of 2022 began.

Forecasts and prospects

Forecasts for this digital asset are mixed.

Most market players believe that, unlike Bitcoin Cash, carrying out a second fork did not make any sense.

But there are also investors who believe that this cryptocurrency is an excellent investment vehicle that will make itself known in the future.

After the launch of Bitcoin Gold, there was a buzz around it. This contributed to the growth of the exchange rate.

However, today, against the backdrop of a general decline in the digital currency market, the situation is not the most positive . At the same time, many investors recommend buying this currency while it is available at the lowest price.

If we take information about the exchange rate forecast from a resource such as WalletInvestor, then by the end of 2022 the cost of the crypto coin should be $2 thousand.

In five years, the value of the BTG coin could reach $10 thousand.

At the same time, in order for the assumptions to come true, developers must solve the following problems:

  • Network security issue. Previously, cyber attacks on the network were recorded.
  • Development of a public development strategy.

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Technical features of the Bitcoin Gold system

The Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency is very similar to its progenitor. It works on the same principle of the PoW (Proof of Work) consensus mechanism, but based on the new Equihash algorithm.

The main distinguishing feature of Equihash is that it does not allow efficient mining of coins only on ASIC devices. Owners of GPU video cards also have the opportunity to actively mine BTG. Otherwise, Bitcoin Gold is very similar to the original BTC.

Here the issue is also equal to 21,000,000 coins. Creating one block takes 10 minutes. After each new chain in the Blockchain network, the difficulty of mining will increase.

What does the company/project do?

Bitcoin Gold is a fork of the Bitcoin block.
At stage 491407, Bitcoin Gold miners began creating blocks with a new proof-of-work algorithm, and this led to a bifurcation of the Bitcoin blockchain. The original Bitcoin blockchain will continue unchanged, but a new branch of the blockchain will be separated from the original chain. The new branch is a separate blockchain with the same transaction history as Bitcoin before the fork, but then diverges from it. As a result of this process, a new cryptocurrency was born.

The goal of Bitcoin Gold is to make Bitcoin release decentralized again. Satoshi Nakamoto's idealistic vision of "one vote per processor" has been replaced by a reality where the production and distribution of mining equipment is dominated by a very small number of entities, some of which engage in abusive practices against individual miners on the network as a whole.

By changing Bitcoin's algorithm from SHA256 to Equihash, all dedicated SHA256 mining hardware will be rendered obsolete for mining the Bitcoin gold blockchain.

In this way, Bitcoin Gold will provide the opportunity for countless new people around the world to participate in the mining process with widely available consumer hardware that is manufactured and distributed by reputable large corporations. More decentralized.

Mining Bitcoin Gold. Difference between SHA-256 and Equihash

Let's talk more about the Equihash algorithm. This innovation in the Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency, according to Jack Liao, will help expand the audience of this Blockchain project, since users here have the opportunity to mine coins not only on expensive ASIC chips, but also on regular video cards.

In this situation, it is possible to achieve greater decentralization of the network (it will be more evenly distributed among all miners), reducing the influence of the largest mining pools and cryptocurrency mining companies. Jack Liao claims that the largest mining companies threaten the network of the original Bitcoin and all other currencies, since they can almost completely stop the movement of the system by stopping the mining process on their farms.

However, the Bitcoin Gold algorithm is protected from such influence of mining pools, since they have no advantage here. In honor of this, BTG even created its own slogan - “Make Bitcoin decentalized again .”

Equihash differs from SHA-256 in that SHA-256 does not require a lot of RAM to process the code. This allows specialized ASIC chips, designed for simple operation, to mine cryptocurrency very efficiently using this algorithm. Equihash, on the other hand, is a complex hashing system that requires a lot of RAM to execute. Here, ASIC chips will no longer be able to productively mine cryptocurrency and will be replaced by GPU video cards.

Another feature of the Bitcoin Gold network is the ability for users to independently choose the block size. By default, the block size in BTG is 1 MB.

Despite the developers' statements about an improved and secure cryptocurrency blockchain system, in 2022 the BTG network was subject to a hacker attack, which resulted in the theft of $18 million worth of coins.

Features of starting the platform

The first block in the new Bitcoin Gold network was mined on October 24, 2017, a day before the official start. It was block number 491 407 - it is used to record the blockchain network. The network itself was planned to be launched by early November. The actual launch of the blockchain and mining, due to massive attacks on the servers, only started on November 13th.

During this time, the developers released 8,000 blocks with a reward of 12.5 BTG during the “premine” process. 95% of these funds will go to the project development fund. How exactly these funds will be used is unknown. The remaining 5% was divided among six developers in equal shares.

At the start, the project looked quite crude. Here are some challenges identified by users:

  • synchronization problems;
  • “51% attack” - at the time of launch, 95% of the power was in the BTGPOOL.PRO pool
  • theft of funds through the wallet of a third-party developer, but posted on the official website.

Despite these shortcomings, after the launch of the network, both traders and miners from all over the world showed interest in the new cryptocurrency.

The development of the project will make this coin an improved decentralized analogue of Bitcoin.

What is needed to mine BTG?

Starting to mine Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency is quite simple. To do this you will need:

  • Personal Computer;
  • Minimum 4 GB of RAM (the more the better);
  • 1 GB video card (more video card capacity means more efficient mining);
  • New drivers for your GPU adapter.

The power of your PC’s processor in this case will not play a special role, since it is practically not used when mining BTG. The characteristics of the video card are more important here.

So, if you have all this in stock, then you can proceed directly to mining Bitcoin Gold. Download the necessary software for mining using the Equihash algorithm. You can find it on many resources on the Internet.

After installing and launching the program, it will automatically determine the optimal settings for your PC, you will not need to do any additional actions (but if you are good at this, you can change them yourself).

When your system starts mining Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency, the miner program will show you something like the following.


Successful Bitcoin Gold mining process

All the necessary parameters of your GPU adapter are displayed here, including its temperature and operating speed, as well as BTG mining power indicators.

As an alternative option for mining coins, you can join any large Bitcoin Gold pool that mines this cryptocurrency at the present time.

Here are some popular Bitcoin Gold pools:

  • Mining S.G.
  • Gold Pool
  • MinerTopia

You can also use popular Bitcoin Gold faucets, which will also give you the opportunity to earn this digital coin:

  • Cranefive (https://cranefive.com/faucets/btg) – pays 0.00000950 – 9.5 times every 60 minutes (minimum withdrawal threshold 0.00500000 BTG).
  • Xcolander (https://xcolander.com/faucets/btg) – pays 0.00000213 – 2.13 times every 15 minutes (minimum withdrawal threshold 0.00300000 BTG).

Network Security

On the first day of launch, the developers announced that they had added a security system against repeated transactions.

Active partnerships with some pools and the creation of a network for testing in a short period of time indicate that the development process of this project is fast, including work on developing the security of the system.

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Benefits of Bitcoin Gold

The Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency has the following advantages:

  • A new hashing algorithm Equihash , which allows miners to efficiently mine coins in this system not only on expensive ASIC chips, but also using conventional CPU video cards. ASICs have no advantage here.
  • Greater decentralization of the network. At the moment, power over most of the digital currencies on the market based on the SHA-256 algorithm is in the hands of the largest pools and mining corporations. In the Bitcoin Gold system, a similar situation will not happen, since here even ordinary users have the opportunity to mine coins using inexpensive GPU video cards. This will give BTG greater decentralization and its even distribution among all network participants.

In addition, the BTG network features improved and more advanced code that is more difficult to hack or cause failure.

Principles of the new currency

The Bitcoin Gold platform is similar to BTC in many ways. Basic principles of networking:

  1. Easy to deposit and withdraw funds.
  2. Speed. Once the transaction is processed, it is instantly credited to the address.
  3. Low commission.
  4. Anonymity. A new protocol and high decentralization are used, which provides additional confidentiality.
  5. Defense against replay attack. The SighashForkId protocol is an effective mechanism that makes new BTG transactions invalid on the Bitcoin network and vice versa.
  6. New address format. It is planned to change the implementation of unique public addresses to addresses other than Bitcoin.

Table 1. Comparison of the main Bitcoin hard forks

Bitcoin (BTC)Bitcoin Gold (BTG)Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
Issue size210000002100000021000000
AlgorithmSHA-256EquihashSHA-256
Mining devicesASICGPUASIC
Interval between blocks10 minutes10 minutes10 minutes
Block volume, exists/needed1MB/2-4MB1MB/2-4MB8MB/8MB
Changing Difficulty1 time every 2 weeksEach block2 weeks + EDA
SegWit supportYesYes
Replay protectionYesYes
Unique addressesYes

Bitcoin Gold Development Team

The founder of BTG is Jack Liao (Linkedin), a major businessman in Hong Kong, who owns the Lightning Asic company, which specializes in selling expensive ASIC mining equipment.

The lead developer of Bitcoin Gold remains incognito. Only his nickname is known : h4x3rotab .

The BTG community also includes:

  • Robert Kuhne is a strategist at BTG (Twitter).
  • Alejandro Regojo - holds the position of organizer (Twitter).
  • Martin Kuvandzhiev – Chief Advisor (Twitter)
  • Franco Niebles – designer (Twitter)


Bitcoin Gold development team
You can study the full list of the team on the official website of the project.

Conflict of interest

Bitcoin Cash and B2X are hostile forks that use the same PoW algorithm as Bitcoin - SHA256, resulting in constant contention over the finite amount of smart ASIC hardware required to solve the SHA256 verification task.

On the other hand, Bitcoin Gold uses the Equihash PoW algorithm, which cannot be solved using ASICs that were designed for Bitcoin. This ensures that Bitcoin Gold does not compete with Bitcoin for scarce resources.

Instead, Bitcoin Gold will have a completely different intelligent infrastructure consisting of general purpose computer hardware (GPU).

How to buy Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency?

You can now buy Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency on many major exchanges. The most popular of them are Bithumb, HitBTC, Binance, Bitfinex, Exmo, OKEx.

The largest supply/demand in the market is carried out on the Bithumb exchange. Here, the daily trading volume of BTG in the BTG/KRW currency pair reaches 11,246,105 US dollars.

For original BTC coins, it is best to buy Bitcoin Gold currency on the HitBTC trading platform (the daily trading volume in the BTG/BTC currency pair reaches 941,631 USD).


Top exchanges by BTG trading volume

The entire list of exchanges that sell Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency can be found on the website coinmarketcap.com in the “Markets” section.

Conclusion

While some are skeptical about Bitcoin Gold, others may find it truly attractive due to the project's main goal of creating a truly decentralized Bitcoin.

It is believed that replacing Bitcoin's original SHA256 algorithm with Equihash, which is believed to open up graphics card (GPU) mining, will attract more participants, making large miners less relevant.

If launched, BTG would likely provide a defense against "mining monopolists" such as firms such as Bitmain, which have been criticized for having too much influence over the network.

However, according to Zhao Dong, a crypto trader and investor, GPU mining cannot serve as a means to prevent centralization since GPU markets are controlled by Nvidia and AMD.

buy cryptocurrency on the Binance exchange, review of the exchange here... or on the KuCoin exchange, review of the exchange here...

How to create a wallet to store Bitcoin Gold

Many investors prefer to store their cryptocurrencies directly on exchange platforms. Indeed, this method of storage is very convenient, simple and accessible to everyone, but the risks of losing digital savings become very high.

The fact is that not only you own the private access keys to your account, but also the developers of the exchange platform on which you store cryptocurrencies. And if there is any hacking of the service by hackers, then perhaps your access keys will fall into their hands. In this case, you will lose your savings and no one will return them to you, since, most often, exchange developers refuse to be held responsible for investors’ accounts.

What BTG wallets are there?

It is best to use more reliable and secure wallets for storing Bitcoin Gold. At the moment, there are several types of such wallets: desktop, online, mobile and hardware.

Let's start with the most relevant ones - desktop ones. BTG desktop wallets are an application that is installed on your PC. It is through it that communication with the server will be carried out (synchronization with the Blockchain network) and your crypto account.

The advantage of such wallets is that they are quite safe, but the disadvantage is that they work slowly (due to the long connection to the blockchain of the cryptocurrency system); desktop wallets also take up quite a lot of space on the PC’s hard drive.

The most popular desktop wallet for Bitcoin Gold is the “Bitcoin Gold Core Wallet” - the official crypto wallet from the BTG developers, which during its operation is fully synchronized with the Blockchain network of the digital coin, thereby ensuring high security.

Its interface is quite simple and convenient for a desktop wallet; installing the application does not cause any difficulties (follow everything according to the basic instructions).

You can download it from this link https://bitcoingold.org/downloads/


Official Bitcoin Gold Core Wallet

The application works for all three systems Linux, Windows, MacOS.

An alternative desktop wallet for storing BTG is the Exodus app. We have already reviewed the Exodus wallet here.

This application allows you to store BTG currency, as well as many other currencies. The Exodus interface is very nice and feature rich, but at the same time simple. There is also a built-in cryptocurrency exchange function.

You can download the application here https://www.exodus.io/releases/

A safer way to store Bitcoin Gold is to use Trezor and Ledger hardware wallets. They are a small device that connects to your computer. The device itself securely enters your private passwords, and then connects to the cryptocurrency Blockchain. Read the full review of the Ledger Nano S device.

At the moment they are the most secure and reliable wallets, this is their advantage. The downside is low speed and high cost.

Each device will cost you at least $100. If you have large savings of BTG cryptocurrency, then it is better to give this money for the safety of your capital.

Mobile and online wallets for storing Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency are more in demand than desktop and hardware wallets. Their main advantage is that they can be used conveniently and quickly at any time of the day; you can always log into your wallet in a few minutes and transfer the desired period to a third-party crypto address.

However, it is worth noting that the security of online wallets is much lower. Very often a situation occurs that a crypto user’s online (mobile) crypto wallet is hacked. That is why we recommend storing only small accumulations of BTG cryptocurrency on them; in other cases, use desktop or hardware “cold” storage wallets.

The most popular online wallets for storing Bitcoin Gold

  • Guarda (https://guarda.co/)
  • Online (https://btgwallet.online/)

The most popular mobile wallets for storing Bitcoin Gold

  • Coinomi (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.coinomi.wallet&hl=ru) – we recommend using this wallet. Read the full review of the Coinomi mobile wallet.
  • Bitpie (https://bitpie.com/#/)

Prospects for further growth in the value of the Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency

Forecasts for the Bitcoin Gold currency are mixed. Some cryptanalysts believe that the creation of this coin simply did not make sense after the appearance of the Bitcoin Cash fork, which immediately gained popularity and support from many crypto users.

Some investors think that Bitcoin Gold technology, improved decentralization of the network and the Equihash mining algorithm have a pretty good prospect that the company will continue to develop at the expense of ordinary miners and, of course, the largest pools.

Now the situation of the Bitcoin Gold cryptocurrency is not the best. At the time the coin was released, when the growth trend of the digital market was just beginning, its popularity and demand were quite high. This can be clearly seen in the BTG growth graph: by the end of December 2022 (just 2 months after the currency entered the market), the value of the coin was able to reach its maximum level of 448 US dollars per BTG piece.

At this time of deep correction, the demand for this cryptocurrency has fallen significantly, and its cost has reached its minimum values ​​- only 25 US dollars per piece.


Bitcoin Gold price

Perhaps, soon, when the growing market trend begins, Bitcoin Gold will again be able to gain wild popularity and return its value to 450 USD. However, so far this asset has been completely quiet.

For some, the current situation is only a plus, since now you can buy Bitcoin Gold for a minimal amount. In the future, in theory, this investment will be able to pay off at least 10-15 times and bring a very large profit. At the same time, you should be aware of the risks of investing in Bitcoin Gold (they are quite high).

We recommend investing no more than 5-10% of your capital in this asset. A strategy like this will help diversify your risks, but always have a good opportunity to make a profit in the long term.

Methods for withdrawing cryptocurrency to fiat

Withdrawal of crypto coins is available through exchanges. Unfortunately, direct withdrawal to fiat is not provided.

To carry out the procedure, it is initially recommended to convert BTG into BTC or another crypto asset.

After this, make a withdrawal to fiat.

Please note that sharp fluctuations in the exchange rate of cryptocurrencies can lead to the fact that such a withdrawal option will involve a commission, which is not very profitable. That is why it is logical to use Bitcoin Gold as a means of investment.

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