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Over the last several months, one of the most-requested features for Wolfram|Alpha has been to add information about the cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Well, you asked, and we’ve answered: Bitcoin data is here!
For those who need a quick introduction, Bitcoin is a digital currency—that is, a currency that is stored and tracked digitally, without a physical counterpart. Instead of being issued and regulated by a central bank, Bitcoin is produced through a process known as “mining,” and unlike many other online transactions, bitcoins can be sent and received anonymously, person-to-person. The advantages and drawbacks of Bitcoin have been heavily debated in recent months, but it’s become clear that the popularity of Bitcoin makes it worth tracking.
Wolfram|Alpha can, of course, provide data about the value of a bitcoin:
On the afternoon of January 20, 1 bitcoin was worth $953 USD (which will almost certainly change by the time you read this post); as seen at the bottom of the query, Wolfram|Alpha will also return conversion rates for yen, euros, and yuan. Wolfram|Alpha also displays the peak and minimum values for Bitcoin over the last year; as the chart above shows, Bitcoin has been a rather volatile currency since the start of 2013.
Once you’ve figured out the value of your Bitcoin, what can you do with it? Most likely you’d want to use your Bitcoin to buy something, and an increasing number of retailers (including, recently, Overstock.com) have begun to accept Bitcoin directly as payment. A particularly interesting example is Virgin Galactic, which is accepting Bitcoin to purchase suborbital spaceflight tickets on their upcoming SpaceShipTwo. The cost for one of these flights in US dollars is currently $250,000. How many bitcoins would this set you back?
The value of Bitcoin has risen dramatically in recent years, as our historical Bitcoin data show. If you wanted to purchase the 263.17 bitcoins necessary for that Virgin Galactic flight—but you could go back in time to January 1, 2011 to do so—how much would it set you back?
Not a bad deal, depending on how much that time machine cost.
As with other currencies, you can create queries that integrate the value of Bitcoin with other data in Wolfram|Alpha. For example, you can take a look at how many bitcoins (or fractions of them) you’d receive on the minimum wage:
If you like our Bitcoin queries, don’t forget about all the other interesting data we have on money and finance, including stock values, mortgage calculations, and even queries for online advertising revenue. Good luck!
WolframAlpha+Bitcoin=Awesome^2
Please accept bitcoin donations. Thank you very much!
Please add LTC (Litecoin) and DOGE (Dogecoin) as well. They are the two other cryptocurrencies with the staying power (currently) of BTC.
Very nice. What is the source of the data? MtGox, some average?
Yes. The information is coming from Mt. Gox.
You should add dogecoin too. It has received a lot of media attention lately, and it is the third most popular coin after bitcoin and litecoin.
As someone who has been using Bitcoin for a long time, I think this is a great tool to have.
It would be even better if it were possible to convert between Bitcoin units (for example, “how much BTC is 0.4 mBTC”)
What price source is used?
Hello,
It might be a good idea to also add information about the blockchain like current difficulty, current (estimated) computer power, etc.
Regards,
Filip
Add data tracking for Dogecoins and Litecoins. Also you could considering to add more data queries that are useful for crypto-currencies users like historical hashrates, difficulty etc. It could be very nice to manipulate that data in WA and that would gain you some more users from these communities.
The use of Mt. Gox for data is a troublingly inaccurate source…
What markets is wolfram currently using for it’s data?
We’re no longer using Mt. Gox as our source for Bitcoin data. If you come across any other issues with our data, though, let us know–thanks!
Interestingly in the UK it has been announced that for tax purposes btc are to be treated as an asset but not as currency which is going to make it really difficult to regulate with the way it keeps going up and down.
I remember the rush to get involved a few months ago when it looked like the price would go up forever and we are now sat at around $400, I think it will come down to about $200 and then settle, I dont think we will see the $1k again, if we do it will not be for a very, very long time
Good job, this is a really great resource
Its tough to find extensive information on Bitcoin (even though it is the most popular cryptocurrency).
Will definitely be using this tool, Thanks!
I don’t think I’ve found a better tool to get the history behind BC, nice job WA! I remember rush to get into Bitcoin was insane, but now it seems to have dropped to an all time low to around $200 – $300 in worth. Same thing with Doge. I hope there’s a resurgence because alternate currencies are just too cool.