We Crunched the Numbers: Women’s Influence in Crypto is Booming

Recently, we partnered with Appinio and surveyed 1,500 crypto users to discover how people are investing in crypto and participating in the space. One of our biggest findings was that women are getting involved with crypto at a rapidly-increasing rate. So what does this mean for the future of crypto?

“It’s encouraging to see women from around the world joining the crypto community and unlocking new financial opportunities,” said Jackie Bona, CEO of Valora. “Crypto has this reputation for being a bit of a boys’ club, but more and more women are now empowered to meaningfully participate in this new financial system. At Valora, we're building our own diverse team with many women in leadership roles, because crypto needs new voices and ideas in order to flourish. We want to exist in a world where everyone has access to tools that unlock financial opportunities. That’s why we’re making a crypto wallet that’s both easy to use and accessible on your mobile device.”

Key findings of the survey include:

Women are making crypto waves as the industry shift continues to accelerate

• Until recently, the space was predominantly made up of men: Over half (51.8%) of men made their first cryptocurrency investment more than a year ago.

• Women are getting more involved in crypto: Nearly two-thirds (60.6%) of women who own crypto made their first crypto investment less than one year ago.

• The rate of women investing in crypto is only increasing: Twice as many women in crypto made their investment within the last six months (28.1%) compared to more than two years ago (13.9%).

People are limiting their crypto potential

• More than a third (37%) of all crypto owners are still using traditional payments platforms (like PayPal) or neo-banks (like Monzo) to store their crypto: this indicates an education/understanding gap of the value of self-custody over non-purpose-built add-ons to existing services.

• Women are even more likely to use such a platform compared to men: 32% of men VS 42.2% of women, highlighting an urgent need for self-custody platforms to build trust with both new and existing users while positioning themselves as the answer to greater crypto control, accessibility, and functionality.

There’s a self-reported gender knowledge gap when it comes to peoples’ understanding of blockchain and crypto

• Gatekeeping blockchain: The majority (70.3%) of token holders that are men say they [at least] understand the concept of blockchain, while only half (50.9%) of women claim the same level of understanding. This is largely due to a lack of programs and communities geared towards welcoming women into crypto.

• Men claim expert status, more than double that of women: 7.7% of men would consider themselves an expert in blockchain, where only 3.3% of women claim the same status.

“It really gets your heart racing to see that women participated in crypto in an increasingly meaningful way this year,” said Morgan Beller, General Partner at Valora investor NFX and co-creator of Diem. “I think the growth can be attributed to need, want, increased understanding/education, and superior product experiences. Valora is an example of a product that is making it easier for more newcomers to feel welcomed in the space. There is a lot more that can be done - as far as education and product experience - but companies like Valora are off to a great start.”

A full interactive breakdown of the data may be found here.

Methodology

The research was conducted on a sample of 1500 crypto and NFT owners/investors aged between 18-65 across the UK, USA, Germany, France and Spain (300 respondents per country). Quotas within the sample were representative according to age and gender for each country. Data was collected via a mobile/online survey conducted by global market researcher Appinio, between March 23rd and April 10th 2022.