Distrust or speculation? The socioeconomic drivers of U.S. cryptocurrency investments

Raphael Auer and David Tercero-Lucas

No 16518, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: Employing representative data from the U.S. Survey of Consumer Payment Choice, we disprove the hypothesis that cryptocurrency investors are motivatedby distrust in fiat currencies or regulated finance. Compared with the general population, investors show no differences in their level of security concerns with either cash or commercial banking services. We find that cryptocurrency investors tend to be educated, young and digital natives. In recent years, a gap in ownership of cryptocurrencies across genders has emerged. We examine how investor characteristics vary across cryptocurrencies and show that owners of cryptocurrencies increasingly tend to hold their investment for longer periods.

Keywords: Digital currencies; Cryptocurrencies; Distributed ledger technology; Blockchain; Payments; Digitalisation; Banking; Household finance; Money; Bitcoin (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D14 D91 E42 G11 G12 G28 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-09
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP16518 (application/pdf)
CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org

Related works:
Journal Article: Distrust or speculation? The socioeconomic drivers of U.S. cryptocurrency investments (2022)
Working Paper: Distrust or speculation? the socioeconomic drivers of U.S. cryptocurrency investments (2021)
Working Paper: Distrust or Speculation? The Socioeconomic Drivers of U.S. Cryptocurrency Investments (2021)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:16518

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP16518

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers Centre for Economic Policy Research, 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().