Bitcoen is world's first kosher cryptocurrency for the Jewish community

Bitcoen is the world's first cryptocurrency aimed at the Jewish community. Set to launch in early October, bitcoen is similar to bitcoin and will be initially valued at $0.75 (£0.58) per coin.

The bitcoen digital currency was created by Russian entrepreneur Viacheslav Semenchuk, who has invested $500,000 into the project. Bitcoin gets its name from bitcoin and Coen, the popular Jewish surname which means priest.

Although anyone will be able to buy bitcoen, Semenchuk believes his currency will appeal to the Jewish community because of how it is managed.

Bitcoen, abbreviated to BEN, will be controlled exclusively by a Jewish community, known as the Council of Six. These will be six respected community leaders from areas like business, politics, finance, technologies, public work and culture.

Semenchuk hopes to attract $20m of investment during the cryptocurreny's ICO, or initial coin offering, a linguistic play on the initial public offering (IPO) of a company floating on the stock market. A preliminary $1m ICO will launch this week for early bitcoen adopters, where the coin will be offered at $0.75. In all, there will be 100 million bitcoen coins, each trading for $1 from October.

Speaking to Russian daily RBK, Semechuk says he hopes the currency will be available via popular trading platforms soon. "We are currently in talks with nearly a hundred trading platforms out of the existing 3,000," he said.

Taking a bullish approach to the future value of bitcoen, Semenchuk believes the currency will have a $1.5bn market cap in two years, potentially making it the seventh largest cryptocurrency in the world. If this happens, then a coin bought for $1 at launch will be worth $15 by late 2019. For context, the current market cap of bitcoin is approximately $55bn, with each coin worth around $3,400.