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How did electronic money appear?

2016-05-28 00:00:00

Electronic money appeared as a result of the development of the Internet and electronic payment systems. Few people have information on how exactly electronic money appeared, the main thing is that they help to develop the modern financial system and make life easier for ordinary network users.

Payment systems have entered our life so quickly and thoroughly that today it is already difficult and inconvenient to make payments in other ways. People have not yet had time to appreciate the main advantages of digital currency, but every day there are more and more users of online payment systems, which means that in the near future, virtual money has every chance of replacing paper counterparts due to their imperfection.

The advent of electronic money marked the beginning of a new era of financial settlements. Now you do not need to carry paper bills with you or use special credit cards that were popular in the 50s of the last century, you just need to create an account in the payment system and enjoy all the benefits of new technologies.

In order to understand how electronic payment systems were born, you need to make a small excursion into history. The first official paperless translation was registered back in 1918. And the place where electronic money appeared is the USA. The FRB (Federal Reserve Bank) made a transfer of funds using a technology that was innovative in its time, the telegraph. This was the first successful attempt to make a money transfer without the involvement of paper notes. However, this case remained in history as an experiment, but no more.

More than 50 years later, namely in 1972, the same FRB created a clearinghouse to ensure the electronic exchange of money. Of course, electronic technology was then at an initial level of development. Nevertheless, it was this year that is considered the beginning of the creation of an electronic finance turnover system. But the main catalyst for the emergence of an electronic settlement system was, of course, the Internet. In the early 90s of the XX century, the World Wide Web, as we are used to seeing it today, did not yet exist.

These were only the first steps in creating an environment for the exchange of information, but even then it was clear that the Internet would become something more than just a means of communication between network users. The virtual world, as one might expect, has become not only a means of communication, business correspondence and simple entertainment, but also the main area where instant money transfers are carried out without unnecessary time, territorial and other types of barriers and restrictions.

 

Reasons for the emergence of electronic currency

How did electronic money appear on the Internet? In fact, everything is quite simple: demand creates supply. While electronic payment systems were underdeveloped, network users were forced to use bank cards to pay for services and buy goods on the Internet.

They were ineffective, but at that time it was the only way to carry out financial transactions on the network. In addition, bank cards had to be tied to specific resources, and their use was quite expensive for ordinary users due to the presence of significant intermediary rates of financial and credit institutions. Among other things, they were highly vulnerable and were frequently subjected to successful hacker attacks.

The attackers only needed to find out the card number (for this purpose, a significant number of fraud methods were created), and they received full access to the "victims" savings. This situation did not suit either Internet users or representatives of the banking system, therefore, the emergence of electronic money did not come as a surprise, but rather a pattern.

Electronic payment systems with enhanced security have provided the much-desired security to users and have become one of the main tools for carrying out financial transactions online. Bank cards have not disappeared, they just started to be used less often in the network, their main functions are still in demand and are important from the point of view of the development of society.

 

What electronic money appeared in Russia

As soon as it became clear that a new and still unoccupied niche of the financial market had opened up, investors immediately appeared who wanted to invest in the development of the corresponding infrastructure. Where a new system of electronic money circulation appears, there is always some excitement caused by the desire of some structures to make them a source of permanent passive income. Pioneer companies will always have an edge, but EPS is fraught with tremendous opportunities for resources aimed at intermediary services.

Online money payment systems in Russia appeared relatively recently, and WebMoney became the pioneer of the Russian-speaking sector. It is considered the first and most popular in the Russian electronic payments market. Today it is WebMoney that offers the best conditions for conducting financial transactions. But the system also has its drawbacks. For example, in order to be able to make money transfers or withdraw funds to a bank card, you need to obtain a minimum of a formal passport. To do this, you will need to send scans of the passport and TIN code to confirm the identity of the client.

Another important Russian payment system is Qiwi. It is not difficult to understand how electronic money appeared, it is more important to understand the scale of development and the importance of cashless payments in the global financial system. The Qiwi payment system, for a short period of its existence, managed to acquire a network of branded terminals in all supermarkets of the country. But thats not all, cooperation agreements were signed with all significant banks in the Russian Federation, which allowed expanding the client base to an impressive number of 50 million users.

Yandex.Money is another electronic payment system developed in Russia. True, Yandex.Money is not so popular, since its commission for foreign exchange transactions is quite high.

Recently, Russian users are increasingly paying attention to foreign payment systems. The fact is that it is unlikely that you can buy any product on eBay without PayPal. And if someone thinks that WebMoney is supported in the West, then he is greatly mistaken. They have their own payment systems. Electronic money appeared in the Western world much earlier, because Russian payment systems are only copies of what has already been invented. Though these plagiarisms are pretty good and work fine.

Russian webmasters are also interested in foreign payment systems. They are not interested in where electronic money first appeared, they are more interested in how money can be transferred from PayPal, Perfect Money, Payza and other Western payment systems to a current bank account or plastic card. The fact is that Russian webmasters who create English-language sites receive payment for advertising on foreign payment systems, while in Russia there is only one system - PayPal. If you need to transfer money from lesser known foreign payment systems to an account with a Russian bank, you can use the services of online exchange resources.

The evolution of electronic money continues today. The next logical round of development was the appearance of virtual monetary units, the ancestor of which was the Bitcoin cryptocurrency. According to the most daring forecasts, in the foreseeable future, alternative coins that have no material embodiment will completely replace traditional fiduciary bills.