Vietnam third largest cryptocurrency gainer in 2023: US analysis firm

Vietnam ranked third in the world for cryptocurrency gains in 2023, only after the U.S. and UK, with nearly $1.2 billion, according to U.S. blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis.

Vietnam was one of five Asian markets in the top 10 countries for cryptocurrency gains last year, besides China, Indonesia, India, and South Korea.

“We can see several upper and middle income countries whose residents appear to have achieved outsized gains. Vietnam, China, Indonesia, and India, for example, all hit over $1 billion in estimated gains,” it wrote in its “2023 Cryptocurrency Gains by Country” report, released last week.

“We previously noted in our 2023 Geography of Cryptocurrency Report that countries in these income categories, and lower middle income countries in particular, showed strong cryptocurrency adoption that remained notably resilient even through the recent bear market. Our gains estimates suggest that many investors in those countries have benefited from their embrace of the asset class,” it added.

In the report, Chainalysis estimated worldwide crypto investors achieved total gains of $37.6 billion last year.

While this total is much smaller than the $159.7 billion made during the 2021 bull market, it represents a significant recovery from 2022, which saw estimated losses of $127.1 billion. Interestingly, the total gains estimate for 2023 was lower than 2021, despite crypto asset prices growing at similar rates in each of those years.

“One possible explanation for this could be that investors in 2023 were less likely to convert crypto assets into cash, under the expectation that prices would rise even higher given that they didn’t surpass previous all-time highs at any point in 2023, unlike in 2021,” it commented.

The U.S. led the way in cryptocurrency gains by a wide margin in 2023 at an estimated $9.36 billion. The U.K. placed second with an estimated $1.39 billion.

China came in a surprise fourth place with $1.15 billion, although cryptocurrency trading and mining activities have been banned in that country since 2021.

In Southeast Asia, in addition to Vietnam, Indonesia ranked fifth with $1.06 billion, the Philippines 20th with $0.5 billion, and Thailand 28th with $0.33 billion.

According to Chainalysis, the positive trends of 2023 have carried over into 2024, with notable crypto assets like Bitcoin achieving all-time highs in the wake of Bitcoin ETF approvals and increased institutional adoption.

“If these trends continue, we may see gains more in line with those we saw in 2021. As of March 13, Bitcoin was up 65.4% and Ether is up 70.2% in 2024,” it said.

To compile the ranking, Chainalysis used on-chain data to estimate investors’ cryptocurrency gains based on movements of crypto assets in and out of services where they can be on or off-ramped into fiat currency.

In its Vietnam Crypto Report 2023 published by Coin98 Insight in January 2024, Vietnam was one of the markets with the highest crypto adoption rate. This has created an opportunity for projects to capture and elevate Vietnam's position on the global crypto map.

In August 2023, the Wall Street Journal reported that Vietnam ranked among the top five countries with the highest trading volume on Binance.

Another popular exchange, OKX, recorded Vietnam as one of the fastest growing markets, while BingX statistics showed that the number of Vietnamese people trading on this exchange increased by 138.4% year-on-year to 143,000 in 2023.

Combining data from several exchanges, the Coin98 Insight report indicated that cryptocurrency investors mainly come from two major cities, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, with a common income of VND10-25 million ($404-1,011) a month. About 48.7% of respondents said they started to participate in the market in 2020-2022, when it was in a strong growth cycle.