- Around 5% of all payments accepted by remote workers was taken in crypto in the first six months of this year, up from 2% in the last six months of 2021.
- Globally, Bitcoin accounted for almost half of all crypto payments, down from two-thirds in the latter half of last year and in line with the benchmark cryptocurrency’s precipitous decline.
While the cryptocurrency markets remain in a bear market, there are still plenty of workers who have not given up on the nascent asset class and even more who are willing to receive payment in digital assets.
According to a survey of 100,000 workers by Deel, which helps companies hire and pay people in over 150 countries, around 5% of all payments accepted by remote workers was taken in crypto in the first six months of this year, up from 2% in the last six months of 2021.
Unsurprisingly, over two-thirds of crypto-accepting workers hailed from Latin America, which has experienced years of high inflation, well before price pressures became a developed world problem.
Although the recent crypto crash this year, amidst tighter monetary policy has wiped out over US$2 trillion in market cap and obliterated some of the industry’s biggest names, exposing hundreds of thousands of individual investors to steep losses, cryptocurrencies have nonetheless proved to be a lifeline in the far more volatile economies of Latin America.
Latin America already has some of the highest interest rates in the world, but heightened borrowing costs have done little to alleviate runaway inflation.
Aggressive monetary tightening in Latin America which is a key global supplier of copper, corn, wheat, oil and soy, has done little to rein in price pressures.
The Bank of Mexico recently implemented record rate hikes with annual inflation at a 21-year high, while Brazil raised rates to combat double-digit inflation.
Argentina, which has long suffered high levels of inflation, raised rates by 3% to a whopping 52% earlier last month.
Yet none of these measures has held back inflation, which is why many remote Latin American workers are more than happy to receive crypto.
Argentina is one of the most popular locations for remote workers to receive their salaries in crypto, to circumvent exchange controls and as a hedge against soaring inflation, with a higher proportion of Argentinian workers getting paid in crypto than anywhere else in the world, according to Deel.
To be sure, Argentina regularly lapses into currency crises and inflation runs at around 60% annually, which could explain why as many as two-thirds of Argentinians invest in crypto, to protect their savings, according to a study by Wunderman Thompson.
Deel’s study also found that a quarter of all workers paid in crypto came from Europe, the Middle East and Africa combined.
Globally, Bitcoin accounted for almost half of all crypto payments, down from two-thirds in the latter half of last year and in line with the benchmark cryptocurrency’s precipitous decline.
