New data proves almost no one uses Bitcoin as currency. It's actually more like gambling
- Written by John Hawkins, Senior Lecturer, Canberra School of Politics, Economics and Society, University of Canberra
Bitcoin boosters like to claim[1] Bitcoin, and other cryptocurrencies[2], are becoming mainstream. There’s a good reason to want people to believe this.
The only way the average punter will profit from crypto is to sell it for more than they bought it[3]. So it’s important to talk up the prospects to build a “fear of missing out”.
There are loose claims[4] that a large proportion of the population – generally in the range of 10% to 20%[5] – now hold crypto. Sometimes these numbers are based on counting crypto wallets[6], or on surveying wealthy people[7].
But the hard data on Bitcoin use shows it is rarely bought for the purpose it ostensibly exists: to buy things.
Little use for payments
The whole point of Bitcoin, as its creator “Satoshi Nakamoto[8]” stated in the opening sentence of the 2008 white paper[9] outlining the concept, was that:
A purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash would allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution.
The latest data demolishing this idea comes from Australia’s central bank.
Every three years the Reserve Bank of Australia surveys a representative sample of 1,000 adults about how they pay for things[10]. As the following graph shows, cryptocurrency is making almost no impression as a payments instrument, being used by no more than 2% of adults.
Payment methods being used by Australians
