New crypto owners nearly doubled in 3 key regions in 2021: Report

More than half of respondents in India, Brazil and Hong Kong made the first purchase of a cryptocurrency like Bitcoin in 2021.

The number of cryptocurrency owners has massively increased last year, with nearly half of all owners worldwide buying crypto for the first time in 2021, according to a new report.

Gemini, a cryptocurrency exchange founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, has polled about 30,000 respondents in 20 countries between November 2021 and February 2022 to provide a picture of a rapidly expanding crypto ecosystem. The company released the survey findings as part of its “2022 Global State of Crypto” report shared with Cointelegraph on Monday.

According to Gemini’s findings, crypto adoption skyrocketed in 2021 in countries like India, Brazil and Hong Kong as more than half of respondents started investing in crypto 2021. The number of such respondents amounted to 54% in India and 51% both in Brazil and Hong Kong.

Elsewhere in the world, Latin America (LATAM) and the Asia Pacific (APAC) respondents were also actively buying crypto in 2021, with 46% of respondents in LATAM and 45% in APAC purchasing their first crypto in 2021. 44% of respondents in the United States and 40% in Europe started investing in 2021, according to the report.

Gemini also found that countries like Indonesia and Brazil are leading the world in terms of the share of cryptocurrency investors among the general population. According to the report, 41% of respondents both in Brazil and Indonesia reported owning crypto, compared to just 20% in the United States, 18% in Australia and 17% in Europe.

Crypto ownership rates are reportedly also significantly high in counties like the United Arab Emirates, Singapore and Israel, with 35% of respondents in the UAE, 30% of respondents in Singapore and 28% of Israeli respondents reporting holding crypto.

The report also cited the uncertainty over crypto regulation and lack of education as two of the biggest impediments to the mass adoption of crypto. Among non-owners, 39% of respondents in APAC, 37% in LATAM, and 36% in Europe said that there was legal uncertainty around crypto. 30% of respondents in the Middle East, 24% in the Asia Pacific and 23% in Latam, also indicated that crypto tax reporting kept them away from buying crypto.

Related: DeFi, Web3, CBDC still unknown for most: Survey

As previously reported by Cointelegraph, Gemini predicted last year that the number of U.S. crypto investors would nearly double in 2021. According to some other surveys, the number of new crypto investors in the country was far more than that in 2021. According to the “Crypto Perception Report 2022” released by the Huobi crypto exchange in January, about 70% of crypto owners in the U.S. started investing in cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) for the first time in 2021.