HONG KONG–A new report has found that at least among users of cryptocurrency, more than three in four expect their countries to become cashless over the next five years.
The report, Digimentality 2022: Fear and favoring of digital currency, released by Economist Impact and commissioned by Crypto.com, provides a gauge of changes in consumer sentiment toward digital currencies and the trend toward a cashless society.
A similar survey was conducted in 2020 and 2021 to measure the relative acceptance of digital currencies and other digital payment methods, and found that the trend towards a cashless society was growing stronger.
A new survey of 3,000 consumers, and another of 150 institutional investors and treasury management respondents was launched in January and February 2022 to assess how sentiment around digital currencies has changed in the past year.
“The survey finds that while the share of respondents who report that they always (as close to 100% of purchases as possible) use digital payments instead of banknotes, coins, or credit cards has remained largely similar over the past two years at 24%, more than three in four consumers expect their countries to become largely cashless within the next five years,” Economist Impact reported.
Even More Optimistic
Indeed, 18% of the respondents predicted the country in which they live will become cashless in the next year or two, compared with 17% in 2021 and 14% a year earlier. In keeping with this trend, only 13% now say their country will never become cashless compared with 19% in 2021 and 28% in 2020, Economist Impact stated.
“The significance of governments’ role in this shift toward a cashless society is made clear by the survey results,” the company said. “For instance, among those who believe their country will become cashless, government and the public sector is seen as the biggest driver of this (49% compared with 27% in 2021). This echoes findings from the institutional survey that regulations can enable acceptance and adoption. On the flip side, government regulations are also picked as one of three main barriers to becoming cashless by more than one in four (27%) of consumers, up from 20% in 2021.”
Additional Findings
Additional findings in the survey and resulting report include:
· 37% of consumers surveyed expect their governments or central banks to launch a CBDC in the next three years. A similar share expects them to make cryptocurrencies legal tender for transactions in their countries.
· The optimism around CBDCs is seen among institutions as well, with 65% saying they expect them to replace physical currencies in their countries, up from 56% in 2021.
· There is also optimism around growing understanding and trust of digital currencies—for example, only 35% consider that a primary obstacle to greater institutional investor or corporate treasury use of open-source digital currencies, down from 47% a year earlier, Economist Impact said. However, a larger share (41%) view regulations as a barrier this year than they did last year (32%).
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