Americans Owning Cryptocurrency Nearly Double From 2018: Survey

By RTTNews Staff Writer | Published: 10/31/2019 11:23 AM ET

Despite being a turbulent year for cryptocurrency, the number of Americans who own a cryptocurrency has nearly doubled to 14.4 percent in 2019 from 7.95 percent in 2018, a strong growth of 81 percent in one year, a latest survey shows.

A survey among more than 2,000 American citizens commissioned by Australia-based financial services firm finder.com found that 14.4 percent or about 36.5 million Americans have invested in some form of cryptocurrency. The survey report titled "A rising number of Americans own crypto" was released in mid-October.

The data from the survey shows that Americans who invested in cryptocurrencies have an average $5,447 in coins, with roughly three-quarters of respondents actually holding less than this amount.

However, the median amount of cryptocurrencies in American digital wallets is just a modest $360 as only an estimated 85.6 percent of Americans want to put their money into a digital wallet.

Though Bitcoin or BTC is the most popular among cryptocurrency owners, 55.4 percent of them have also invested in another form of cryptocurrency such as Ethereum, Litecoin, XRP etc.

The survey said 61 percent of the respondents or an estimated 22.3 million Americans also cited using a coin as a form of investment as the main reason for them choosing to own a cryptocurrency.

The second most common reason for using cryptocurrency cited by 29.3 percent of the respondents or an estimated 10.7 million Americans was for transacting payments.

This was followed by 25.3 percent of the respondents or an estimated 9.3 million Americans wanting to store their savings outside of traditional banks. 18.2 percent of those surveyed or an estimated 6.6 million Americans said they own cryptocurrencies for sending money overseas.

The survey also found a major gender gap in cryptocurrency holding as men owning cryptocurrencies outnumber women by twice the rate, with 19 percent men owning cryptocurrencies compared to just 10 percent of women. This translates to about 23.6 million men and 12.9 million women.

Of the Americans surveyed, 47.9 percent or about 103.4 million Americans say it's too complicated or difficult to understand, 45 percent think they aren't interested and 23 percent think crypto is too much of a risk.

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Article written by an RTT News Staff Writer, and posted on the RTT News.com website.

Article reposted on Markethive by Jeffrey Sloe

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