India Has The Highest Number Of Crypto ‘Hodlers’ In The World

Global financial regulators, U.S ones especially, have been trying their best to make it as difficult as possible for the crypto industry to grow. Despite all the efforts, data shows a positive trend with crypto adoption, especially in many developing nations.

India, despite their on-going regulatory woes, stand out as the country with the most crypto ownership. 100 million people in the country, or 7.3% of the population hold crypto assets.

India’s top exchange, WazirX, ranks highly on CoinMarketCap’s exchange score, which looks at web traffic, liquidity, and volume. BTC/INR turn over is very high, with $40.3 billion transacted in the last 24-hours.

While this might not come as a surprise, you might be surprised at the country with the highest number of hodlers relative to the size of the population (or maybe not).

Singapore-based TripleA compared the crypto ownership by country. In compiling their data on global adoption, the primary source was a report by blockchain data analysts Chainalysis called “The Chainalysis 2020 Geography of Cryptocurrency Report.”

This report gives a geographical analysis of cryptocurrency patterns based on:

• the country’s on-chain cryptocurrency value received,
• the country’s on-chain retail value transferred,
• the number of on-chain country cryptocurrency deposits, and
• the Peer-to-Peer exchange trade country volume.

This data was then cross-referenced and weighted against reports from 16 other sources, including from Binance, Willy Woo, and Gemini, to derive their final numbers.

The report concludes that crypto adoption is growing on a global scale. And based on their figures, they estimate there are 300 million crypto hodlers globally, which represents 3.9% of the world population.

Global Crypto Ownership by Country

The top 10 countries with the most hodlers show a surprising number of developing nations on the list. Interestingly, China doesn’t appear on the list, which may understate the macro picture. But nonetheless, the top 10 are:

• India – 100.7 million
• USA – 27.5 million
• Russia – 17.4 million
• Nigeria – 13 million
• Brazil – 10.4 million
• Pakistan – 9.1 million
• Vietnam – 6 million
• Ukraine – 5.6 million
• Kenya – 4.6 million
• Philippines – 4.4 million

Countries with the highest hodlers as a percentage of the population also throw up some surprises with notable crypto powerhouses, such as South Korea, not making the top 10.

• Ukraine 12.73%
• Russia 11.91%
• Venezuela 10.34%
• Singapore 9.04%
• Kenya 8.52%
• USA 8.31%
• India 7.30%
• South Africa 7.11%
• Nigeria 6.31%
• Colombia 6.14%

Earlier this month, after legalizing crypto in a near-unanimous vote, Ukraine’s President Zelensky signaled his intent to go one step further and make Bitcoin legal tender, as El Salvador has done.

There are reports of President Zelensky forming a close relationship with President Bukele in sharing ideas and plans for the financial future of their respective nations.