Welcome to Fintastic Females, where we embark on the adventure of finding the mythical island of freedom together. I’m Rupali with my co-host, Kalyani, your friendly finance experts sharing our experiences in the world of money and energy. Today, we have a special guest, Yashutana, who is an expert in blockchain integration and works as a blockchain engineer at a cryptocurrency exchange. We’re excited to have him on board to discuss the basics of crypto for those who are unfamiliar with it. Many people have heard about crypto and blockchain but struggle to understand them fully. We hope that Yashutana can shed some light on these topics and simplify them for us. Yashutana shares that crypto is short for cryptocurrency, which is a digital currency used in the digital economy. It allows for the transfer of value across the internet without intermediaries. The internet serves as the platform for these transactions. Yashutana explains that cryptocurrencies are like digital currencies used to facilitate trade in the digital economy, transcending geographical borders. Cryptocurrencies utilize cryptography, a mathematical science, to ensure secure and verifiable transactions. Yashutana uses the analogy of collecting gold coins in the game Super Mario to illustrate how cryptocurrencies provide utility and value within their respective environments. He emphasizes that while crypto can seem complex, one doesn’t need to grasp all the technical aspects to understand it. Rupali then shares her personal experience with crypto, including a traumatic incident where she mistakenly sent funds to the wrong address and was unable to retrieve them. Despite her mixed experiences, she acknowledges that crypto can be a rewarding space if approached with caution and knowledge. The discussion then shifts to blockchain, which Yashutana explains is a data structure that came before cryptocurrency. At its core, blockchain consists of blocks, which are lists of ledger entries, and chains, which represent the continuous addition of blocks in a linear fashion. Each ledger entry is a snapshot of the state of the ledger at a specific point in time. Yashutana provides a simple example of a blockchain’s ledger entries representing different balances and transactions between addresses. He also mentions that blockchain scalability allows for practical applications beyond just cryptocurrencies. The conversation concludes with a mention of regulation and the need for education in the crypto space. Yashutana acknowledges the importance of regulators protecting vulnerable individuals and believes that proper regulation and education can go hand in hand to ensure a safer and more understandable crypto landscape.