An April 2024 survey funded by the Digital Currency...

An April 2024 survey funded by the Digital Currency Group and published by the crypto lobbying group The Blockchain Association was not shy about aiming its messaging directly at politicians, trying to convince them of the existence of a sizable crypto voting bloc.

#CitationNeeded #crypto #CryptoLobby #USpolitics #USpol

Key Findings 6 Crypto as a voting issue could present a key opportunity for political candidates. • The vast majority of voters overall and Crypto-Positive voters plan to vote in the upcoming 2024 elections (90%+)and are closely split in party lean. • A sizeable number of voters (40%) wish political candidates talked more about digital currency. • Most voters do not trust elected officials to understand innovative technology like crypto, and more than half are concerned about policymakers stifling innovation via overregulation. The vast majority want policymakers to be sure they understand crypto before regulating. • Nearly half of voters do not trust political candidates that would interfere with crypto. One-quarter say that enthusiasm towards crypto would make them trust a political candidate more. 30% would be more likely to support a political candidate that is friendly to crypto. • The Crypto-Positive bloc is even more strongly in favor of pro-crypto positions than overall voters.

Like 29 Jul 2024 at 23:02 | Open on hachyderm.io

5 comments

Molly White

A glance at the survey design quickly reveals the story the industry was hoping to tell with the results. Even more profound are the kinds of questions that were not included, which could have provided a clearer (but perhaps unwanted) view of voters’ actual beliefs.

#CitationNeeded #crypto #CryptoLobby #USpolitics #USpol

A glance at the survey design quickly reveals the story the industry was hoping to tell with the results, asking respondents to agree or disagree with statements like “Crypto is more equitable than the traditional financial system” and “Crypto represents a new way towards financial security and prosperity”.

Even more profound are the kinds of questions that were not included, which could have provided a clearer (but perhaps unwanted) view of voters’ actual beliefs. While the poll invited respondents to agree or disagree with the statement: “Crypto is a major issue I’m considering during the next election”, they failed to distinguish between respondents who viewed crypto negatively or were hoping for stricter regulations, and those who might support crypto-friendly candidates. There were no questions inquiring about how people prioritized cryptocurrency alongside other common election issues. There were no questions aimed at determining if a respondent might be willing to overlook other policy disagreements, or partisan alliances, if a candidate aligned with them on crypto.

Furthermore, the summary of survey results betrays the industry’s attempt to present this seemingly manufactured narrative. Without digging into the numbers, the survey summary seems to support the industry’s story that there is a sizable group of voters — in swing states, no less! — looking for any crypto-friendly candidate they can support. The numbers, on the other hand, reveal that 69% of the survey respondents held a negative opinion of cryptocurrency. And nowhere does the survey mention that out of the 252 people who responded that “crypto is a major issue I’m considering during the next election”, 100 of them held a negative opinion of the asset class.

29 Jul 2024 at 23:02 | Open on hachyderm.io

Molly White

Furthermore, the supposed number of crypto holders (“52 million”!) that companies like Coinbase like to throw around come largely from a poorly-designed survey with methodology its designers seem unwilling to disclose, and are vastly higher than other estimates.

#CitationNeeded #crypto #CryptoLobby #USpolitics #USpol

The American cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase, which is behind the Stand With Crypto advocacy group and super PAC [I62], loves to trot out the figure: “52 million Americans own crypto”. This would suggest that more than 20% of adult Americans hold crypto. Other even higher figures have been presented, including those as large as 100 million — or more than 1/3 of the adult population. The thinking goes: if such a large proportion of Americans own crypto, surely they will support crypto-friendly candidates at the ballot box.c

The number is, however, highly dubious.

The 52 million figure comes from a 2023 Coinbase-funded survey by Morning Consult that dramatically contradicts other surveys, such as a report from the Federal Reserve7 that found that only 7% of adultsd had engaged in any use of cryptocurrency that year (including buying or holding), and, furthermore, that that figure was shrinking. The Fed survey also notes that their number may skew high because the survey was conducted online.

Table 21. Cryptocurrency use
Type of use 2021 2022 2023
Bought cryptocurrency or held
as an investment 11 8 7
Used cryptocurrency to buy
something or make a payment 2 2 1
Used cryptocurrency to send money to friends or family 1 2 1
Any use of cryptocurrency 12 10 7
Note: Among all adults. Respondents could select multiple answers.

Statistician David Marker recently opined in an interview with Jake Donoghue:

“This survey has not provided enough information to refute claims of it being low quality and spurious. [Morning Consult] hasn’t presented evidence to make you feel comfortable… with a survey which was funded by an organization which would like and benefit from these results.”

Marker then noted his concerns that there may have been a serious sampling flaw in Morning Consult’s survey that, if it exists, would invalidate the numbers entirely. Though Donoghue was able to discuss the survey with Morning Consult, they stopped responding when he asked about their sampling and methodology, and never responded to his follow-up inquiries.

29 Jul 2024 at 23:06 | Open on hachyderm.io

Molly White

Regardless of the caricatures that have emerged, most cryptocurrency holders are pretty normal people, with nuanced political beliefs and hopes for the future that go far beyond the tokens they hold in their digital wallets.

#CitationNeeded #crypto #CryptoLobby #USpolitics #USpol

But it is also important to separate the bitcoin billionaires and the wealthy executives in the cryptocurrency industry from the much larger group of people that industry is claiming are mobilizing on their behalf. As I noted a few weeks ago:

(Quoted tweet): it's interesting to me that even some on the more ideological end of crypto see billionaire executives and VCs spending money on politicians and go "yes, good, they're fighting for me"

While some have indeed chosen to align with those executives, either believing what they say about fighting for broad crypto freedoms or in apparent hopes of trickle-down policies that will benefit them too, others recognize that executives fighting to install politicians they think will help their businesses are well divorced from their own interests. Even some of the wealthy and powerful in the space, such as Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin, have noted that the industry’s priorities seem misplaced, focusing far more on money than on related and important political issues around freedom and privacy that the industry claims to champion.

The average cryptocurrency holder — those people who make up the majority of the “52 million” or “18 million” or whatever the actual number of holders may be — is not likely to be a single-issue voter. Many people who hold crypto — a group, I will note, of which I am a part!e — probably don’t identify as crypto advocates at all. They’re worried about the climate, or their right to own firearms, or the safety and support of transgender people, or the various wars and genocides playing out across the globe with the support of the United States, or reducing corporate taxes, or their ability to obtain an abortion or retain access to contraceptives, or access to school vouchers, or any of the many other issues that factor in when people choose which candidates to support and oppose.

Because we are wanting of any proper survey data, I am left to merely hazard an informed guess that few crypto holders (self-identified advocates or otherwise) are willing to set aside all of their other political beliefs and priorities in favor of a candidate’s crypto stance. Regardless of the caricatures that have emerged, most cryptocurrency holders are pretty normal people, with nuanced political beliefs and hopes for the future that go far beyond the tokens they hold in their digital wallets.

29 Jul 2024 at 23:07 | Open on hachyderm.io

Molly White

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#CitationNeeded #crypto #CryptoLobby #USpolitics #USpol

29 Jul 2024 at 23:08 | Open on hachyderm.io

Mark Kraft

@molly0xfff Of course, crypto is increasingly the ONLY way for Russian individuals and companies to complete purchases with China, etc.

A recent article says that about 80% of Russian transactions to China in yuan are blocked now, due to Western pressure and a crackdown on smaller banks, based near the border. As long as Russian crypto exchanges remain a thing, crypto itself is at significant risk of disruption.

29 Jul 2024 at 23:12 | Open on mastodon.social