Report Says Cryptocurrency Market Registered 119 Million New Owners In 2022 Despite Crash

According to a 2022 Crypto.com Market Size Report, 119 million new cryptocurrency owners were added between January and December 2022. This number represents an increase of 39%, bringing total global owners to 425 million.

Those statistics are interesting because a reduction or at least a stagnation of cryptocurrency owners would be expected due to the 2022 market downturn. Surprisingly, more cryptocurrency owners were added in last year’s brutal bear market.

More about the Crypto.com report

According to the crypto.com report, global cryptocurrency owners increased 39% in 2022, from 306 million in January to 425 million in December. A further breakdown shows that Bitcoin owners of reference digital assets went from 183 million in January to 219 million in December, representing an increase of 20%. The largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization accounts for 52% of cryptocurrency owners globally.

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Bitcoin’s strongest growth occurred in April when the Central African Republic became the second country to adopt BTC as legal tender after EI Salvador. There was also a spike in BTC adoption in November during the Qatar 2022 FIFA World Cup.

The second largest cryptocurrency, Ethereum, grew from 24 million in January to 87 million in December, representing a 263% increase over the last 12 months. Data shows that the largest DeFi token accounts for 20% of cryptocurrency owners globally. The two major cryptocurrencies (bitcoin and Ethereum, with a combined market capitalization of over $587 billion, continue to dominate over 70% of the total crypto market.

Crypto.com’s findings point to the Ethereum network merger in September as the main catalyst behind the network’s high adoption rate. Remember that the upgrade, regarded as a landmark achievement for the crypto community, marked the completion of the network’s transition from a proof-of-work to an energy-efficient proof-of-stake consensus algorithm. Other factors that drew traffic to the network also include interest from institutional investors and the popularity of liquid ETH staking.

The crypto.com report corroborates the findings of an earlier Triple-A report in 2022. The latter put global users at 320 million at that point and projected an increase beyond those figures by 2023. The Triple-A report A then ranked the US, Pakistan, India, Nigeria, and Vietnam as the top 5 countries where cryptocurrency owners live.

Crypto Growth Trajectory

With the impressive growth rate in 2022, the number of cryptocurrency holders is also expected to increase significantly in 2023. The cryptocurrency adoption rate reportedly accounts for around 4% of the global population. Not entirely impressive, but the growth has been exponential and there are signs that the trend will continue into 2023.

Many platforms have been integrating blockchain products. Most notable are Facebook and Instagram, which have tested NFTs on multiple smart contract cryptocurrencies. Additionally, free speech-focused social media platforms such as Telegram and Signal have been integrating crypto features into their platforms with TON.

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5 trends that will define the blockchain space in 2023

According to Blockdata in Oct 2022, top institutions like Microsoft, Visa, Nike, Oracle, PayPal, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Chase & co, MasterCard, T-Mobile, Toyota, Alphabet, Chevron, Shell and many others use blockchain for their daily operations. These international companies have billions of users combined, and only a small percentage of crypto adoption by their users would remain significant.

According to a Crypto.com report published on December 20, 2022, taking into account the growth rate and depending on market conditions, the number of digital asset owners should reach 600-800 million by 2023.

2023 is a breakout year for blockchain, and enthusiasts are eager to see what the year holds for the industry.