Whether you are a newcomer to the cryptocurrency world or just getting into blockchain, the three concepts you cannot avoid are: Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and stablecoins. These three sectors are like the 'gold, operating system, and dollar alternative' of the digital world, serving as the foundational pillars of the Web3 world.
🔶 Bitcoin: Digital Gold
Birth: 2009, proposed by the mysterious figure Satoshi Nakamoto.
Total Supply: 21 million coins, scarcer than gold.
Security: The total network has a computing power exceeding 500 EH/s (data from 2025), equivalent to the most powerful distributed computing network in the world.
Value Proposition: Censorship-resistant, immutable, scarcity.
Institutional Holdings: MicroStrategy holds over 210,000 BTC (about 1% of the circulating supply).
🔷 Ethereum: The World Computer
Birth: 2015, founded by Vitalik Buterin and others.
Role: Can deploy 'smart contracts,' supporting rich applications like DeFi, NFTs, DAOs, etc.
From PoW to PoS: Completed 'The Merge' in September 2022, saving over 99% energy annually.
Ethereum Staking: Currently, over 30,000,000 ETH are staked on the Beacon Chain, reflecting the security and depth of PoS.
Annual ETH Burn: Under the EIP-1559 mechanism, hundreds of thousands of ETH are burned each year, reducing circulating supply.
🟡 Stablecoins: The Cornerstone of Digital Dollars
Scale: The total market value of global stablecoins exceeds $160 billion (data from June 2025), with USDT accounting for over 70%.
Function: Hedging for trading pairs, DeFi collateral, cross-border payments.
Regulation: The US SEC and European MiCA regulations are focusing on the compliance issues of stablecoins.
Risk: Transparency of stablecoin reserves, whether audit reports are true and trustworthy.
💡 Summary & Tips
BTC is an inflation-resistant store of value.
ETH is a programmable financial world.
Stablecoins are bridges and lubricants.
Want to invest? First understand their fundamentals, don't follow the trend blindly.