After a wild few weeks in the market, more than eight in 10 adults in the U.S. say they’ve heard of Bitcoin, and nearly one in 10 (8%) own it themselves, according to a SurveyMonkey Market Research Solutions Pulse. Compared with all U.S. adults, Bitcoin owners are more likely to be younger, male, and to have an income over $100,000.
Opinions on Bitcoin are mixed. Among those who’ve heard of it:
- 12% consider it a useful form of currency that provides a much needed alternative to U.S. dollars
- 22% say it’s a good investment opportunity, but not as useful as a currency to purchase goods and services
- 35% say it’s too risky to invest in, and it’s susceptible to fraud
- 15% say it’s worthless currency that will eventually crash
Most who’ve heard of Bitcoin (53%) say it’s not likely to become a common currency accepted as payment within the next five years. Just 12% say it’s “very likely” to become a common currency in five years.
More now than in 2018 view Bitcoin as a growth investment
Bitcoin has been a media darling for years and its awareness hasn’t changed since 2018, but activity is up significantly: Bitcoin ownership has doubled from three years ago, when just 4% of adults owned Bitcoin. More people today say they would invest in Bitcoin over U.S. stocks, international stocks, real estate, and a savings account, if they had an extra $1000 to invest (from 7% in 2018 to 11% now).
Bitcoin owners are even more bullish on its growth path now than they were three years ago: 64% this week said they think Bitcoin will be worth significantly more five years from now than it is today, up from 47% in 2018.
The number of Bitcoin owners who view it as a growth investment increased from 63% to 74% in the past three years, the number who view it as a store of value grew from 29% to 36%, and the number who invest in Bitcoin to hedge against traditional asset crashes jumped from 22% to 38%.
Bitcoin owners are still bullish
Most of those who own Bitcoin say they personally own it “as a growth investment” (67%). Cited less frequently, 31% say they own it “to support the development of blockchain technology,” 30% say they own it “to hedge against traditional asset crashes,” 29% say they own it “as a store of value,” 23% say they own it “to avoid government regulation,” and 13% “as a currency to purchase goods and services.”
More than half of those who own Bitcoin (54%) have purchased it in 2020 or 2021, during which time the price of one Bitcoin has skyrocketed, from about $6000 in early 2020 to nearly $50,000 today. Most Bitcoin investors surveyed (68%) say they originally spent $1,000 or less on their Bitcoin investment.
Bitcoin investors are not trading frequently: 36% say they’ve only bought or sold Bitcoin one time, 13% typically do so annually, 26% monthly, 18% weekly, and just 5% daily.
Most Bitcoin owners (56%) purchased their Bitcoin on a cryptocurrency exchange such as Coinbase, but another 41% used a traditional stock brokerage such as Robinhood. A majority (57%) say they plan to buy more Bitcoin in the next three months, and just 7% plan to sell some or all of their Bitcoin. Another 35% say they will hold.
Dogecoin and others trail Bitcoin
Whereas 81% of people had heard about Bitcoin, just 21% have heard of Dogecoin, 15% about Ethereum, 12% about Litecoin, and 8% about Ripple.
Tesla’s announcement has big effect--but only among Bitcoin owners
Tesla recently made news with an announcement that it has bought $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoin and that it would start accepting Bitcoin as a payment method for its products. Still, the majority of adults in the U.S. (71%) as well as investors who have money in the stock market (71%) say this announcement has no effect on their plans to buy or sell Bitcoin. However, the news is pushing Bitcoin investors to up the ante: 61% of Bitcoin owners say they are more likely to buy Bitcoin as a result of Tesla’s announcement.
Read more about our polling methodology here.
Click through all the results in the interactive toplines below:
