Cryptocurrency trading in NZ below world average, but signs show increased awareness

A recent study has revealed that although cryptocurrency is still a growing market in New Zealand, the country's usage rate is still well below those of our overseas counterparts.

9% of Kiwi adult internet users, which is an estimated 324,000 people, said they owned cryptocurrency according to the latest Cryptocurrency Adoption Index survey conducted by Finder.

This is up from 7% in October 2021, but the average ownership rate globally is sitting at 15%.

Finder's cryptocurrency editor Keegan Francis says that even though people choose not to partake in the crypto market, a large majority are aware of its existence and are actively researching it.

"While adoption is low, crypto awareness is high among Kiwis compared to their global counterparts," he says.

"64% of Kiwi adults know what cryptocurrency is, placing them ahead of countries like Russia (60%) and the United States (59%)."

Bitcoin was revealed to be New Zealand's most popular cryptocurrency, with 50.8% of crypto owners owning the coin.

New Zealand also came in with the highest global adoption ranking for Solana (22.6%), coming in at 4th out of 27 countries.

Men in New Zealand were also roughly 2.3 times as likely as women to own cryptocurrency. Among crypto owners, 70% indicated as being a man compared to 30% who indicated being a woman.

Looking at a global scale, Vietnam (28.6%), India (23.4%) and Australia (22.9%) were found to have the highest rates of cryptocurrency ownership among internet users. Conversely, Japan was found to have the lowest uptake, with only 5.8% of adults saying they own any cryptocurrency in December.

Crytpo also remains a topic of debate when it comes to simplifying money transfers and preventing economic damage (increasing the risk of crime), and the research found that there may be some drastic changes occurring in the future.

The six countries of Nigeria, the Philippines, India, Vietnam, Colombia and Mexico have more than 1% of their GDP made up by remittances. Additionally, all six of these countries rank in the top 10 for countries we looked at in terms of perceived levels of public corruption.

These countries deal with high levels of perceived corruption, so it's little wonder that positivity toward the use of crypto is high in each, with Nigeria ranking 1st, the Philippines at 2nd, India at 4th, Vietnam at 6th and Colombia at 8th in terms of positivity.

The ongoing research surveyed individuals across 27 countries to analyse cryptocurrency adoption rates, investment diversification, and investors' demographics and has garnered 93,528 responses.