A recent survey conducted by HSBC polling 13 developed nations indicates that the majority of citizens still have not heard of blockchain technology, with only 41% of respondents indicating familiarity with the technology underpinning bitcoin.
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HSBC’s Report Adds to a Growing List of Surveys That Indicate Bitcoin and Blockchain Technology Is Still in Its Early Years of Development
A recent survey conducted by HSBC showed that 59% of consumers had not heard of blockchain technology. Of the 41% of respondents who were familiar with the technology underpinning bitcoin, 80% stated that they did not understand how blockchain technology operates.
The survey polled 2,000 HSBC customers from the United Kingdom, in addition to 1,000 participants from Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Mexico, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and the United States respectively.
HSBC’s report adds to a growing list of surveys that indicate bitcoin and blockchain technology is still in its early years of development, with early-majority adoption still yet to be seen.
A survey conducted by Cambridge University this year determined the current number of unique active users of cryptocurrency wallets is estimated to be between 2.9 and 5.8 million. Despite representing just 0.04 – 0.05% of the global population, this data indicates that the bitcoin userbase has at least doubled in just two years. With such a tiny percentage of citizens actively engaged in the bitcoin community, 40% of citizens being aware of blockchain technology evidences the enormous growth potential of cryptocurrency.
Despite the Recent Media Coverage, Majority Still Unfamiliar With Bitcoin and Blockchain Technology
Monex, Inc., Tradestation Securities, Inc., and Monex Boom Securities (H.K) Limited released a survey this month that polled retail investors holding accounts with China, Japan, and the United States respectively. The results showed that only 3% of Japanese and US retail investors are actively investing in cryptocurrency, with 10% of Chinese investors reporting that they were investing in cryptocurrency. 20% of Chinese and US-based retail investors reported that they were not at all familiar with cryptocurrency. Nearly all polled Japanese investors had heard of bitcoin and cryptocurrency, likely owing to Japan’s highly publicized liberal legal apparatus surrounding cryptocurrency.
Despite the recent spike in bitcoin’s media coverage, it would appear that the majority of people are still unfamiliar with bitcoin and blockchain technology. With consumer polls in developed nations indicating that 59% of citizens are still unfamiliar with blockchain technology and only a small minority of retail investors are actively involved in the Japanese, Chinese and US cryptocurrency markets, it would appear that bitcoin still has enormous growth potential.
Do you think bitcoin is approaching early mainstream adoption, or is bitcoin still in its nascent years? Share your thoughts below!
Images courtesy of Shutterstock and HSBC
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