Only 4.4% of U.S. Holders Use Crypto for Payments

Last year, 5.6 million households in the U.S. lacked access to banking services. It’s in this environment that the use of cryptocurrencies is most prevalent. 

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) published the results of a large-scale survey conducted in 2023. Approximately 60,000 households in the United States were surveyed. Key findings show that 4.2% of households, or about 5.6 million, didn’t hold a bank or credit union account. Of these, 66.2% relied entirely on cash, with the remainder using a combination of prepaid cards and FinTech services like PayPal, Venmo, and Cash App. 

The “underbanked” category, which includes households that have bank or credit union accounts but regularly use non-bank products and services to meet their financial needs, is relatively widespread. This group comprised 14.2% of households in 2023, approximately 19 million in total. 

Cryptocurrency was used by 6.2% of unbanked households, compared to 4.8% among banked households. Among digital asset owners, 92.6% used them as an investment and only 4.4% as a means of payment. 

According to a survey conducted last year by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), over half of U.S. citizens under 18 cited cryptocurrency as their first financial investment.