Module 1: Welcome to Crypto 101

Cryptocurrency has been called the “future of money”, but for most people, it’s utterly baffling. Some say it’s a scam, others think they missed the boat, and some just don’t know where to start. If you’re in one of these camps, let’s change that…

By the end of this module, you’ll be able to confidently explain:

✅ What crypto is and why it matters.

✅ How blockchain works like backyard cricket.

✅ What gives Bitcoin value.

✅ Why major companies, banks, and even governments are adopting crypto.

Once you’ve completed this module, you’ll be ready to talk about crypto with confidence.

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Section 1: "Show Me The Money!"

The History of Money (And Why It’s Broken)

For most of human history, people traded physical goods by bartering. But this was inefficient, you couldn’t exactly carry around cows and bags of corn to pay for things.

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💰 Gold and silver became money because they were scarce and valuable (and people like shiny things). 

📜 Then came paper money, which was originally backed by gold. Fun fact, in the UK, paper money was backed by silver, hence why it’s called ‘The Pound Sterling’. 

🏛 In 1971, the US government abandoned the gold standard, meaning money was no longer tied to any real-world asset—it became fiat currency (money backed only by government trust - not an Italian car). This unlocked a lot of opportunity, as the money supply was now untethered from the amount of gold in storage. But it also created a host of potential problems…

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The Pain Points With Modern ‘fiat’ Money

1️⃣ “This beer cost how much?!”

Inflation – Governments can print more money when they need to, reducing its value. 

Before fiat currency came along, the currency in circulation was directly linked to the gold stored in vaults. 

Now central banks, like the Reserve Bank of Australia, can simply ‘create’ more money. Wondering why inflation has run wild since Covid? Governments around the world simply printed their way out of economic ruin. But more money doesn’t mean everyone is richer. 

Imagine a town with $100 and 100 meat pies, each pie costs $1. Now, let’s print another $100 so now there is $200 in the town, but the number of pies stays the same. Each pie now costs $2.

This is inflation, when more money is printed without increasing goods/productivity, prices rise, and your money buys less.

What’s worse is when inflation is higher than bank interest rates so your money in the bank actually loses value every year. Not happy, Jan.

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2️⃣ Lack of Control – Banks can freeze accounts, limit withdrawals, or block transactions.
Ever had an account frozen or a transaction blocked? Ever been asked to explain a transaction to the bank before they let you have your own money? Ever wanted to withdraw more money than you could but you reached your daily limit? 

These are all too common problems and really just shows how little control we have over our own money when it’s in a bank.

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3️⃣ Slow and Expensive Transfers – Sending money internationally takes days and involves high fees. SWIFT fees, bank fees, processing fees, exchange rate fees, recipient fees, hidden fees. There are even ATM fees for withdrawing your own money.

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4️⃣ Cash Is Disappearing – Digital transactions are the norm, but banks and governments monitor and control them. Big brother is watching. Your money is effectively controlled by large centralised institutions. 

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💡 Crypto was created to fix these problems by giving people money that is decentralised, inflation-proof, and outside government and institutional control.

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Section 2: Bitcoin – The Birth of Crypto

What Is Bitcoin?

Bitcoin was launched in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto, an anonymous person (or group). It was designed to be decentralised digital money that can be sent anywhere in the world without banks, middlemen, or restrictions.

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🔹 Instead of being controlled by a government, Bitcoin runs on a blockchain — a secure, public ledger where transactions are verified by a global network of computers.

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Blockchain explained at a Dinner Party – How Decentralised Consensus Works

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Five friends Alice, Sam, Charlie, David, and Emma are sitting around a dinner table. Alice wants to send Sam $20. Here’s how they use decentralized consensus to record the transaction without a bank:

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1️⃣ Everyone has a notebook 📖 – Alice, Sam, Charlie, David, and Emma each have a notebook (representing the blockchain ledger 📜).

2️⃣ Transaction request 💸 – Alice says, “Sam, I need to send you $20.”

3️⃣ Everyone verifies the balance 🔍 – Charlie, David, and Emma check their notebooks and confirm that Alice has $100.

4️⃣. Consensus reached 🤝 – Everyone agrees Alice has enough funds to send $20 to Sam.

5️⃣ Transaction recorded ✍️ – Alice’s balance is reduced from $100 to $80, and Sam’s balance increases from $100 to $120.

6️⃣ Everyone updates their notebooks 📝 – Charlie, David, and Emma all write down the new balances, ensuring everyone has an identical and updated record.

7️⃣ Transaction complete ✅ – Sam now has $120, Alice has $80, and the transfer happened without a bank or central authority 🏦❌.

8️⃣ The Troublemaker 🚨 - What if someone pretends they already sent some money or have more money than they actually do? The rest will reject this as the majority rules 🏛.

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This is exactly how Bitcoin’s blockchain works but on a massive global scale:

✅ Everyone (computers/miners) has a copy of the transaction history.

✅ If someone tries to fake a transaction, the network rejects it.

✅ If a computer goes offline, the network continues because thousands of others have the full record.

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This is called decentralised consensus, a way to verify transactions without needing a central authority like a bank (or an umpire). More on this in the next module, all about Blockchain.

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Why Is Bitcoin Valuable?

Bitcoin isn’t just magic internet money, it’s valuable because of its unique properties:

✔ Scarcity: Only 21 million BTC will ever exist, preventing inflation.

✔ Decentralisation: No single person, government, or company can control it.

✔ Security: Transactions are permanently recorded on a public blockchain.

✔ Borderless: Bitcoin can be sent anywhere, instantly, with very low fees.

✔ Self-Custody: You own it directly, no bank can block your access.

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How Bitcoin Is Created (Mining Explained Simply)

Bitcoin isn’t printed, it’s mined by powerful computers solving complex math puzzles.

🔹 Every 10 minutes, transactions are grouped into a block.

🔹 Miners (computers) compete to solve a cryptographic puzzle.

🔹 The first miner to solve it confirms transactions and earns new Bitcoin.

🔹All of the transactions in that block are added to a chain of previous blocks… and that’s where ‘blockchain’ comes from.

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Bitcoin Supply Facts:

🔹 19.7 million BTC have already been mined.

🔹 Only 1.3 million BTC remain to be mined.

🔹 The last Bitcoin will be mined around the year 2140.

Bitcoin’s fixed supply of 21 million coins was mathematically hardcoded into its protocol when it was created. This means no government, company, or individual can change the code and create more Bitcoin beyond this limit. 

Unlike traditional money, which banks can print endlessly, no new Bitcoin can ever be created. This scarcity is what makes Bitcoin similar to gold and helps protect it from inflation.

Early Days (The famous Bitcoin Pizza Purchase):
Bitcoin's first real-world transaction occurred in 2010 when Laszlo Hanyecz spent 10,000 BTC on two pizzas. At today’s prices, that transaction would be worth over $1 Billion USD, a testament to Bitcoin’s exponential growth.

💡 Fun Fact: Satoshi Nakamoto’s identity remains one of crypto’s greatest mysteries. Some speculate it’s an individual genius, while others believe it could be a group of developers.

Not So Fun Fact: A recent estimate suggested that around 3-4 million bitcoins are lost. A Welsh computer engineer lost 8000 Bitcoin ($1.2 billion) when his girlfriend mistakenly threw out a hard drive in 2013. He’s now trying to buy the landfill site to try and recover the hard drive before it is turned into a solar farm.

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The Rise of Altcoins (2011-2015) – Expanding Crypto Beyond Bitcoin

Bitcoin’s success led to the creation of alternative cryptocurrencies (altcoins), each attempting to improve or expand on Bitcoin’s technology.

In 2011 Litecoin emerged as a “lighter” version of Bitcoin, offering faster transactions and lower fees.

Then in 2012 came Ripple, built for instant, low-cost cross-border payments, targeting banks and financial institutions.

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And then came Ethereum…

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Smart Contracts – The Next Evolution of Crypto

Bitcoin Is Great, But It’s Just Money. What Else is There?

Bitcoin revolutionised money, proving that people could exchange value without needing banks, governments, or intermediaries. But what if blockchain technology could do more? That’s where Ethereum (ETH) comes in.

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The Birth of Ethereum: Expanding Blockchain Beyond Money

Ethereum was launched in 2015 by Vitalik Buterin, a developer who saw Bitcoin’s limitations and wanted to build a more flexible blockchain that could support a wider range of applications.

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🔹 Think of Bitcoin as digital gold — valuable but not very flexible.

🔹 Ethereum is like a programmable financial system — allowing developers to create applications on top of it.

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Instead of just sending and receiving money, Ethereum introduced a way to automate agreements and build decentralised applications (DApps).

Smart Contracts: Automating Transactions Without Middlemen

Ethereum’s biggest innovation was smart contracts—self-executing agreements that run automatically when conditions are met.

Kinda like a vending machine:

• You put in money, press a button, and get your item automatically—no cashier needed, the vending machine simply follows a process and delivers your item when payment is made.
• That’s what smart contracts do, execute agreements without banks, lawyers, or other third parties.

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Smart contracts are transparent, trustless, and unstoppable, once they are written on the blockchain, they cannot be altered or tampered with. BTW, ‘trustless’ doesn’t mean you can’t trust it. It means you don’t need to!

But Ethereum’s growth has not been without issues…

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Ethereum’s Challenges: Why New Blockchains Were Created

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Scalability – Slow Transactions & High Fees

Ethereum can only process about 15 transactions per second (TPS). Compared to Visa, which can handle thousands of transactions per second, Ethereum quickly became congested as more people used it.

Because of this, transaction fees (gas fees) became expensive, sometimes costing $50 or more just to send a transaction.

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Ethereum vs. New Blockchains: The Roads Example

Imagine Ethereum is a two-lane highway and blockchain companies (we call them projects in crypto) are cars driving on the highway. There are toll booths every 10 km. 

As more and more projects are launched, more cars start driving on the highway, traffic builds up, congestion becomes an issue, and fees rise.

To solve this, new blockchains were created with faster speeds and lower costs:

• Solana (SOL) – A highway with 8 lanes and toll booths every 100 km (very fast, very cheap).

• Avalanche (AVAX) – A superhighway with multiple lanes processing transactions in parallel.

• SUI (SUI) – A Maglev train that leaves every second and speeds passengers to the destination.

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Each of these blockchains competes with Ethereum, but Ethereum still dominates for now because:

✅ It was first – The biggest projects and developers started on Ethereum.

✅ It’s secure – Ethereum has been tested for years with billions of dollars in value.

✅ It’s upgrading – Ethereum 2.0 and Layer 2 solutions (like Arbitrum & Optimism) are making it faster and cheaper.

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Ethereum paved the way for an explosion of blockchain innovation. Thousands of Decentralised Applications (dApps) have been built on blockchain solving challenges in finance, gaming, and more.

Check out www.coingecko.com to see the full list of blockchain-powered projects. At the time of writing, there are over 15,000 projects trading on over 1000 exchanges with a combined market cap (value) of over $5 Trillion AUD. 

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The Evolution of Crypto – What Problems Different Projects Are Trying to Solve?

🚀 Speed & Scalability:

• Bitcoin processes ~7 transactions per second (TPS).

• Ethereum handles ~15 TPS.

• Newer blockchains like Solana & Sui boast 65,000+ TPS.

• Layer 2 solutions (Arbitrum, Optimism) aim to scale Ethereum.

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🏦 Decentralised Finance (DeFi):

• Problem: Banks control lending, borrowing, and trading.

• Solution: DeFi platforms (Uniswap, Aave, MakerDAO) allow anyone to participate in finance without a bank.

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🎨 NFTs & Digital Ownership:

• Problem: Digital items (art, music, in-game assets) can be copied easily.

• Solution: NFTs prove ownership & authenticity, making digital assets scarce and valuable.

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🌍 Cross-Border Payments:

• Problem: Sending money across borders is slow and expensive.

• Solution: Stablecoins (USDT, USDC, XRP) and Bitcoin Lightning Network enable instant, low-cost payments.

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🔗 Interoperability (Blockchains Talking to Each Other):

• Problem: Different blockchains don’t communicate with each other.

• Solution: Projects like Polkadot, Cosmos, and Chainlink enable cross-chain data sharing.

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👀 “But wait, isn’t crypto just a trend?”

No. Crypto, and its underlying technology with blockchain (more on that later), is a paradigm shift in how we can solve very real problems. The proof is in the pudding with, billions of dollars flowing into the sector every week. Money talks.

Ultimately, governments and institutions are taking crypto seriously:

• BlackRock, Fidelity & Major Banks – The biggest financial firms now offer Bitcoin ETFs.
• Trump & US Politicians – Trump announced plans for a US Strategic Bitcoin Reserve.
• Countries are Buying Bitcoin – El Salvador and Central African Republic even made Bitcoin legal tender.
• CBDCs (Central Bank Digital Currencies) – Governments are testing blockchain-based money which may end up replacing national currencies.
• The crypto industry is now worth nearly $5 trillion AUD, with over 26,000 developers actively building Web3 projects

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💡 Crypto isn’t just a trend, it’s a major technological shift that’s reshaping how we think about money, finance, and ownership.

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Time for an episode of MYTHBUSTERS: CRYPTO EDITION!

Common Myths About Crypto (And the Truth Behind Them)

🚫 Myth #1: “Bitcoin isn’t real money.”

💡 Truth: Bitcoin is used globally for payments and as a store of value.

✅ Accepted by major companies (Tesla, Microsoft, Shopify).

✅ Used for global remittances with lower fees than banks.

✅ Recognised as legal tender in countries like El Salvador and Central African Republic.

💡 If Bitcoin isn’t real money, why are governments and businesses using it?

🔹 What’s happening now?

• Bitcoin ETFs approved → Wall Street investing.
• Countries adding Bitcoin to reserves → Digital gold.
• Crypto adoption is growing faster than the early internet.

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🚫 Myth #2: “Crypto is for criminals.”

💡 Truth: Crypto transactions are public and traceable—cash is harder to track.

✅ Only ~0.24% of crypto transactions in 2023 were illicit.

✅ Every transaction is recorded on the blockchain permanently.

✅ Law enforcement actively tracks and seizes stolen crypto.

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🚫 Myth #3: “Buying 1 Bitcoin is too expensive.”

💡 Truth: You can buy fractions of a Bitcoin

🔹 Bitcoin is divisible into 100 million sats (smallest units).

🔹 $10 AUD buys 0.0001 BTC if Bitcoin is $100,000 AUD.

🔹 Wayex and other exchanges allow micro-purchases for as little as $10 AUD

💡 You don’t need to buy a whole Bitcoin—just ‘stack sats’.

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🚫 Myth #4: “Crypto is just a bubble.”

💡 Truth: Crypto has survived multiple crashes and keeps growing.

📉 Market Cycles:

• 2013: Bitcoin drops from $1,000 → $200.
• 2017: Bitcoin drops from $20,000 → $3,000.
• 2021: Bitcoin drops from $69,000 → $15,000.

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🔹 Why does crypto recover?

✅ More users and businesses adopt it.

✅ Network security keeps improving.

✅ Governments are integrating it into financial systems.

💡 Bubbles pop and disappear—crypto keeps coming back stronger.

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🚫 Myth #5: “Crypto is bad for the environment.”

💡 Truth: Crypto is becoming greener.

✅ Ethereum cut energy use by 99.9% in 2022 (Proof-of-Stake).

✅ Bitcoin mining is now ~60% powered by renewables.

✅ Gold mining & traditional banking use more energy than Bitcoin.

💡 Bitcoin mining is shifting towards sustainable energy.

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🚫 Myth #6: “If I lose my wallet, I lose everything.”

💡 Truth: Crypto wallets can be recovered (Provided you have your seed phrase).

✅ Seed Phrases – A 12-24 word backup restores lost wallets.

✅ Multi-Signature Wallets – Require multiple approvals for security.

✅ Reputable Exchanges (Wayex, Binance, Coinbase) – Offer recovery options.

💡 As long as you back up your seed phrase, your crypto is safe.

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🚫 Myth #7: “Governments will ban crypto.”

💡 Truth: Most governments are regulating, not banning crypto.

✅ The U.S. approved Bitcoin ETFs, making it mainstream.

✅ Europe passed MiCA regulations, creating legal clarity.

✅ Australia, Singapore, and other nations have crypto-friendly policies.

💡 Governments are integrating crypto, not banning it.

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Final Takeaway: The Truth About Crypto

✅ Crypto is not a scam or bubble, it’s a financial revolution.

✅ It’s never too late to start, you can buy Bitcoin in small amounts here on Wayex.

✅ Bitcoin, Ethereum, and blockchain tech are looking to shape the future of finance.

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Quiz – Test Your Knowledge!

Here’s a 15-question multiple-choice quiz based on Wayex Academy – Module 1: Intro to Crypto 101.

Each question has four answer choices, with the correct answer indicated.

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Scoring:

🎯 13-15 Correct: Crypto Pro! 🚀 You’ve mastered the basics and can confidently explain crypto to anyone.

✅ 10-12 Correct: Well Done! You have a solid understanding—keep learning and exploring.

🧐 7-9 Correct: Good Start! You’re getting there, but review some sections again.

❌ Below 7 Correct: Keep Learning! Go back through the module and try again.