Financial Literacy, Risk Tolerance, and Cryptocurrency Ownership in the United States

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RWP 24-03, March 2024

Cryptocurrency owners without sufficient financial literacy and risk tolerance may be financially vulnerable, as the cryptocurrency market is highly volatile and lacks consumer protections. Our study divides cryptocurrency owners into three groups based on their purpose for holding cryptocurrencies—for investment only (investors), for transactions only (transactors), and for a mix of investment and transactions (mix users)—and examines how each group correlates with financial literacy and risk tolerance compared to consumers who do not own cryptocurrencies (nonowners). Using the 2022 Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking, we find that investors and mix users are significantly or moderately more financially literate and risk tolerant than nonowners, but transactors are less financially literate and slightly more risk tolerant than nonowners. We also find that the three groups of cryptocurrency owners vary by demographic and financial characteristics. Our findings highlight that transactors could be particularly financially vulnerable in the absence of consumer protections in the cryptocurrency market.

JEL Classifications: D14, D91, E42