A Study on Investor’s Awareness, Perception and Usage of Crypto-currency in India

Abstract

Crypto-currency was first introduced about twenty-seven years ago. There are more than a thousand cryptocurrencies available on the market. Among them, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Tether, USD Coin, Ripple etc. are some examples of cryptocurrencies which are traded on a large scale on the market. There are 119 million crypto-investors in our country. The people aged below 35 in India are the leading investors in cryptocurrency. Investors are mostly from the metropolitan cities like Delhi, Mumbai, and Bengaluru. There was a huge surge in crypto-investment during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study was conducted to analyze the investor’s awareness, perception and usage of cryptocurrency in India based on the data collected from a survey. Different charts and diagrams were used to interpret the data. It was found that more than 80% of the respondents did not like to invest in cryptocurrency. Out of non-investors of cryptocurrency, some respondents thought that cryptocurrency has no intrinsic value, some respondents thought that the cryptocurrency market is volatile, and some thought that as fundamental analysis is not possible in currencies like the stock market, their investment would be at risk in the future. But 10-12% of respondents who are investors in cryptocurrency thought that the cryptocurrency market would grow in future as it is highly decentralized, not controlled by any intermediaries, and the digital economy is the future.

Introduction

Cryptocurrency is a digital currency secured using cryptography and stored as unique alphanumeric hashes. Introduced by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009 with Bitcoin, it is primarily used for investment, trading, and occasional purchases. Cryptocurrencies operate on blockchain technology, offering a secure, decentralized, and tamper-proof system. While legal in India, crypto is mainly used for investment rather than as a transactional currency. El Salvador became the first country to adopt Bitcoin as legal tender in 2021.

Benefits of Cryptocurrency:

1. Security: Resistant to tampering and counterfeiting.

2. Accessibility: Crypto wallets can be accessed globally with internet, no documentation required.

3. Protection from currency fluctuations: Uniform value worldwide.

4. No intermediary: Transactions are free from government influence and additional fees.

Limitations of Cryptocurrency:

1. Potential for illegal activities: Anonymous nature may facilitate money laundering or ransom.

2. Risk of loss: Data loss if devices storing crypto are lost or damaged.

3. Limited acceptance: Not recognized as legal tender everywhere.

4. Irreversible transactions: Mistaken payments cannot be recovered.

5. Price volatility: Long-term value is unpredictable; technical analysis is needed for short-term predictions.

Blockchain Transaction Process:

1. Request transaction → 2. Peer-to-peer network validation → 3. Nodes validate → 4. New block created → 5. Transaction concluded.

Literature Review Insights:

• Cryptocurrency awareness is growing in India, but legal and security concerns remain (Devayani et al., 2024).

• Blockchain has transformative potential across finance, data security, and business models (Hameed, 2019).

• Price prediction uses machine learning and social media sentiment analysis due to high volatility (John et al., 2024).

• Adoption in India carries both opportunities and threats, with investors seeking regulation for security (Srinivas et al., 2023; Shrivas et al., 2022).

• Popularity is higher among males and younger populations (<35 years), with interest growing in professional and educated demographics (Shaikh et al., 2022).

Study Objectives:

1. Examine investor perception of cryptocurrency for investment and trading.

2. Evaluate the perceived future potential of the crypto market.

3. Investigate the influence of demographics on cryptocurrency usage.

Research Methodology:

• Primary data: Online survey of 56 respondents using questionnaires.

• Secondary data: Collected from websites, magazines, and books on cryptocurrency history and market growth.

Key Survey Findings:

• Gender: 75% male, 25% female.

• Age: Majority (43%) aged 18–25; young investors dominate.

• Education: Most respondents have professional/diploma courses (32%) or PhDs (29%).

• Annual Income: 50% earn up to ?5 lakh annually; lower income groups dominate.

• Source of Awareness: 45% learned about crypto via online news, 39% via social media.

Conclusion

1) It can be concluded from the analysis that male respondents are more aware of the cryptocurrency than females. There are 75% male respondents whereas there are 25% female respondents. 2) Most of the respondents (about 43%) belong to the young age group, i.e. 18–25. The participants of the cryptocurrency market are the young population, which indicates that there is high potential for growth of the cryptocurrency market in India. 3) Most of the respondents, about 50% of the total respondents, belong to the annual income group up to 5 lakh and out of 7 investors of cryptocurrency, 3 investors (approx. 43%) belong to the income group up to 5 lakh. It can be concluded that the lower income group is more in the cryptocurrency market than other income groups. 4) Only 12%of respondents participate in crypto trading and crypto investment, which is a very small portion of total participants in the currency market. Out of 12%, only 2%of investors feel very comfortable in cryptocurrency investment, which indicates that the currency market has not gained much confidence from investors. 5) 11%of respondents have ever used cryptocurrency for purchases, which is not a significant portion of total respondents. It can be inferred from the analysis that cryptocurrency is not popular to use as a traditional currency for purchase. 6) More than 50% of the respondents believe that cryptocurrency may become a mainstream currency in future and 12% of the respondents strongly believe that it will happen. So, there is high potential for growth of cryptocurrency in the form of the mainstream currency. 7) More than 50% of the respondents believe that regulations are necessary for the cryptocurrency market. As the cryptocurrency market is highly volatile and not regulated by any entity. But in India, at least some basic rules and regulations should be implemented to attract more investors into the currency market. 8) The 12% of the respondents who are investors in cryptocurrencies like to invest in cryptocurrency because there is high security of transactions due to cryptography. No intermediaries are involved in such transactions, blockchain technology executes and records each transaction properly. More than 80% of the respondents who are not investors or traders of cryptocurrency think that regulations are required in the cryptocurrency market to ensure the security of investment, there is no intrinsic value of cryptocurrency, and high volatility in the cryptocurrency market.

References

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Copyright

Copyright © 2026 Devmalya Khan. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.