Retail Investors' Interest In Cryptocurrencies Lower Than 2017

Bitcoin's price hit a new all-time high this week, surpassing $28,000. At the time of this writing, the bitcoin price has undergone a slight correction to $26,714. The data shows that the rally that drove bitcoin's price up was likely driven by institutional investors, as there was no uptick in retail markets.

Data from Google Trends provided by Skew Analytics indicates that retail investors are not as keen on bitcoin as they were in 2017. According to analysts, there are several reasons for the lack of interest. In 2017, ICOs were a major engine of the crypto rush, with new projects and blockchains popping up almost daily. However, later on, tight regulation canceled most of them, and altcoins collapsed, many of which never recovered. Moreover, Skew Analytics pointed to the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) as an example of institutional interest in the cryptocurrency space, as it now manages over $16.3 bln in assets.

Messari researcher Ryan WATKINS predicted that next year institutions will be buying up Ethereum, the second-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, pointing out that if Bitcoin has value, other cryptoassets could be valuable as well.

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