The financial crisis of 2008 shook the entire world and exposed the flaws in the world of Banking. However, financial analysts around the world have been noting a similar trend over the past few months now. The COVID-19 pandemic contributed to widespread interruption in the global economy, resulting in central banks embracing quantitative easing.
As per records, the U.S Federal Reserve’s balance sheet was approaching $6 trillion, as of 24 April 2020. These funds were earmarked for small businesses running illiquid almost immediately. This inefficiency of the traditional market, coupled with an unprecedented unemployment rate, gave rise to the narrative of Bitcoin being able to change this.
As banks struggled to cut down on direct contact with clients, the use of paper money also fell as people around the world opted for e-payments methods. While holding cash was getting difficult, many looked to cryptocurrencies as alternatives.
According to a recent research report by The Tokenist, trust in Bitcoin has grown across generations since 2017. The survey compared data points from 2017 and 2020 and noted that trust in Bitcoin had noted an upward trend among its 5000 respondents across 17 countries.
This trust wavered with the older generation of age 65 and above, but 51% of the millennials were reported to trust Bitcoin over Banks like Wells Fargo, JPMorgan, and Goldman Sachs. Out of the total responders, 47% trusted BTC over banks. This could be a result of the recent volatility of assets held by big banks and the increased professionalization of the cryptocurrency sector. As many businesses started out in 2017, the trust was not reflected much in the crypto-world. However, this changed as 2020 took shape and BTC proved to be an essential investment asset.
Source: The Tokenist
It must be noted, however, that despite the fact that trust in Bitcoin has gained and trust in banks and financial institutions has fallen, the latter continues to enjoy considerable support. If anything, the aforementioned study has revealed that cracks seem to be appearing on the facade of the market’s traditional institutions.
Interestingly, this isn’t the first time Bitcoin and millennials have been spoken of in the same sentence. In fact, an online Harris poll last year had revealed that Millennials were more likely to be familiar with Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency, and were more likely to see Bitcoin as a positive innovation in financial technology. Further, other reports have also claimed that Bitcoin’s market cap will rise sharply as soon as millennials are at the end of wealth transfers in a few years.
