Over the past few days, I have received a handful of requests from people who asked if I could look into BitStar, because they released a beta wallet. As I am always happy to oblige, let’s take a look at what this is all about, shall we?

If you browse around on BitcoinTalk and do a search for BitStar, you will notice their original thread dates back to April 2014. However, I’m only now getting requests to look at this coin, even though four months have passed. So what has happened during this time?

A lot of beta testing has been going on, that’s for sure. But more on that in a bit. THe most important thing is that BitStar is in its Proof-of-Stake phase, as the mining phase ended in May 2014. During this time, 15 million coins were mined using the Scrypt algorithm. Even though May is far behind us, the total coin supply hasn’t increased by much, which is currently sitting at 15.8 million coins. You can find the current coin supply here.

Another thing worth of note about BitStar’s history is the fact this altcoin never had an IPO. There was a 3% pre-mine though, of which only 25% remains at this point. I like cryptocurrency in its non-IPO form to be honest, but that’s just a matter of personal preferences.

I did mention something about a wallet which is currently in beta, which is why this article is being written in the first place. The main feature about this BitStar beta wallet is the fact it has a built-in peer-to-peer fiat exchange. Do keep in mind you may encounter an error or a glitch while using this beta wallet, and if you do so, please report them to the developers as soon as possible.

More features are planned to be added to the next release of the BitStar client, including an ecommerce platform which will allow sellers to exchange their Bits for fiat currency. Sellers will also receive a free web version of their shop, in order to attract a broader audience from both inside and outside the world of cryptocurrency.

Official announcement : https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=574652.0