This text does not constitute any financial investment advice.
The hottest topic in the cryptocurrency circle in the second half of 2023 is undoubtedly Bitcoin Inscriptions. Some people have minted a large number of ordi inscriptions with a fee of only 300 dollars, and now each ordi has soared to thousands or even hundreds of times its original value, selling for a total price of 100,000 dollars.
Bitcoin Inscriptions refer to using the Ordinals protocol to write content into Bitcoin satoshis for engraving. Bitcoin satoshis are the smallest unit of Bitcoin, and 1 Bitcoin can be divided into 100 million satoshis. Each satoshi is sorted using ordinal theory and has a corresponding ordinal number, making it a unique identifier.
The content of inscriptions can be encoded text, images, videos, audios, and other types of content. After engraving, they are permanently stored on the Bitcoin blockchain.
In simple terms, it means signing (writing content) on the smallest unit of Bitcoin, satoshis, and then speculating on the signed satoshis to earn the price difference. It can be understood as signing a card of a famous athlete, and the value of the signed card will fluctuate with market supply and demand.
Generation and circulation of inscriptions:
- Deploying inscriptions: Anyone can deploy inscriptions by customizing the content and quantity of the inscriptions and paying Bitcoin transaction fees. Deploying inscriptions is like planting a tree, where you can customize what kind of tree (content) to plant and how many fruits (quantity) it will bear.
- Minting inscriptions: Anyone can mint inscriptions that have been created and have a surplus by paying a fee. Minting inscriptions is like picking fruits from a tree, but only from trees that still have fruits.
- Buying and selling inscriptions: Anyone can buy inscriptions from others, which also means they can sell inscriptions, creating a market supply and demand relationship.
All of the above actions are based on BRC-20, which deploys token contracts, mints and transfers tokens by using the Ordinal protocol to set inscriptions as JSON data format.
Minting and buying/selling inscriptions require a wallet that supports the Ordinals protocol, such as UniSat. Linking the wallet to any Ordinal marketplace, taking OKX as an example here.
BNSS, 𝕂, 0522, etc. are inscriptions. You can choose which inscription to mint or buy. Taking BNSS as an example, the floor price refers to the minimum number of satoshis per BNSS in the current market. On the right side, you can mint BNSS by paying the transaction fee or list your existing BNSS for sale. The bottom section shows the BNSS currently available for sale in the market.
The earliest group of people who speculated on inscriptions in mid-2023 have already made a fortune. Now, new inscriptions are constantly being deployed, so minting and buying inscriptions require caution. It is necessary to carefully consider whether the content of the inscriptions is worth investing in (similar to premium phone numbers).