In the meantime, the Indian government is considering a middle path on cryptocurrencies, as it finalises legislation on the virtual asset to be introduced in the upcoming winter session of Parliament. The hard-line stance for an outright ban of cryptos is not being found feasible in view of large investments in such instruments by Indians, and these unregulated virtual currencies are also unlikely to be allowed as a legal tender.
Bitcoin is inarguably the most famous cryptocurrency to date. Designed by an anonymous individual under the pseudonym ‘Satoshi Nakamoto’ in 2008, it is the biggest by some distance in terms of market capitalization.* It can be used as a medium of exchange, with companies in sectors ranging from travel to gift cards to jewellers having accepted Bitcoin as payment through anonymous transactions.

Yet some crypto watchers have raised red flags over SafeMoon’s unusual structure. It charges a 10% fee to buy tokens and another 10% to sell -- almost unheard of in the digital currency world. Half of these fees are paid to owners as an incentive to keep holding and the other half goes into a liquidity pool controlled by the developers. SafeMoon calls itself a DeFi token, or one that uses decentralized finance to govern functions through software, but it has a chief executive officer and chief operating officer. Critics also worry about the discretionary nature of the “manual” coin burns used to adjust its circulation.
Polygon is an Ethereum token that powers the Polygon Network, which aims to provide faster transactions on the Ethereum blockchain.