Vietnam leads global crypto adoption, US comes fifth

On September 14, Chainalysis released a report on Global Cryptocurrency Adoption for 2022. The research revealed that Vietnam has the highest crypto adoption, followed by the Philippines and Ukraine as second and third, and the United States coming in fifth.

The report stated that the dominance of emerging countries in the adoption index, which stood out last year, continued this year as well. According to the World Bank’s income categorizations, Vietnam, the Philippines, Ukraine, India and Pakistan are lower middle income countries. Brazil, Thailand, Russia and China, on the other hand, are countries with an upper middle income.

Only the United States stands out in the top 10 as a high-income country.

Changes since last year

This year marked Vietnam’s second consecutive year at the top of the leaderboard, coming in first for crypto adoption.

The US was ranked sixth in 2020, eighth in 2021 and fifth in 2022. Although it registered a slight de-ranking from 2020 to 2021, the US still holds the middle line and stands out as the only high-income country with such high adoption.

China was ranked 13th last year, but this year managed to make it to the top 10. The report states that China is particularly strong in centralized services, which led to higher adoption. The World Bank says the country’s ban on crypto trading was either ineffective or loosely enforced because it didn’t stem the adoption surge at all.

Adoption rise despite the bear market

Another highlight from the report was the adoption rate. Overall, crypto adoption worldwide declined due to the bear market, but managed to stay above pre-bull market levels.

According to the report, adoption rates have increased steadily since mid-2019. The adoption rate reached its record high in the second quarter of 2021 and has been up and down since. The report states:

“[adoption rates] has fallen in each of the last two quarters as we have entered a bear market. Still, it’s important to note that global adoption remains well above pre-2019 market levels.”