Buying cryptocurrency in the US is increasingly associated not only with age, income, or risk tolerance, but also with political preferences: Republicans invest in digital assets, sell them, or use them for payments more often than Democrats, and the gap has become especially noticeable after Donald Trump returned to the White House and shifted toward the crypto industry.
A Pew Research Center survey published June 8 showed that 22% of Republican Party supporters reported ever buying, selling, or using cryptocurrency, including Bitcoin and Ethereum. Among Democrats, 17% of respondents gave this answer. A total of 8,512 US adults participated in the study.
Until 2026, party affiliation had almost no effect on interest in digital assets. According to Pew Research Center, Republicans and Democrats used cryptocurrencies at about the same level. But since 2021, the share of Republicans who dealt with such assets has grown from 16% to 22%, while among Democrats the figure has barely moved.
Cryptocurrency Has Become Part of a Political Signal
Morning Consult political analyst Eli Yokley believes that a steady partisan bias began to form around mid-2023 and then sharply intensified during the 2024 presidential campaign. He cites Donald Trump’s personal support for cryptocurrencies as one of the main factors.
This shift is especially noticeable against the backdrop of his previous position. During his first presidential term, Trump sharply criticized digital assets. In 2019, he wrote that he was not a fan of cryptocurrencies, called them unregulated, and warned that such currency could be used in illegal schemes, including drug trafficking.
In the 2024 campaign, the rhetoric became the opposite. Trump promised to ease regulation, appoint more industry-friendly officials, and create a Bitcoin reserve. His family also actively entered the crypto market: American Bitcoin, a company founded by the president’s sons, went public, and Trump himself, before returning to the White House, introduced the $TRUMP memecoin, known as Official Trump.
Later, the first lady Melania Trump launched her own asset, MELANIA or $MELANIA. This move hit the value of her husband’s memecoin and became another example of how the Trump family brand became linked to the crypto market. In this situation, a blockchain token ceased to be just a financial instrument and began to be perceived as part of a political identity.
From Memecoins to a Strategic Reserve
After his victory, Donald Trump announced the creation of a strategic cryptocurrency reserve. It is to include:
- Bitcoin (BTC)
- Ethereum (ETH)
- Ripple (XRP)
- Solana (SOL)
- Cardano (ADA)
In 2025, he also signed the first major US federal law on digital asset regulation — the Guiding and Establishing National Innovation for U.S. Stablecoins Act, or GENIUS Act.
The Trump administration in its second term stated that it wants to turn the US into the “crypto capital of the world.” Pew Research Center notes that the White House has taken steps that could open the way for crypto companies to achieve banking status.
The practical side of the market — a crypto wallet, verification, debit card, PayPal, or a mobile exchange app — fades into the background in this discussion. Pew Research Center and Morning Consult studies primarily record another shift: cryptocurrencies have become more deeply embedded in the political culture of American conservatives.
How Buying Cryptocurrency Works in Practice
For individuals, buying cryptocurrency is available through exchanges, exchangers, and P2P platforms. The usual process is: choose a platform, register, complete verification, fund the account, select a cryptocurrency, and confirm the transaction.
Most often, payment is made by bank card, bank transfer, e-wallets, or cash. Before choosing a platform, people look at reliability, fees, support for needed currencies, and interface convenience.
The rate for 1 Bitcoin and other coins — Ethereum, Ripple, Solana, Cardano — changes in real time, so it is checked on the chosen platform before the transaction. It is not necessary to buy a whole coin: you can buy a fraction of an asset for $100. The calculation is simple: $100 is divided by the current coin price to get the amount of cryptocurrency.
After purchase, cryptocurrency is stored in a hot or cold wallet. A hot wallet is more convenient for quick transactions; a cold wallet is more often chosen for more cautious storage. The main security rules are to protect access, not share keys, and carefully check platforms to reduce the risk of fraud.
Buying cryptocurrency involves risks: the price can change sharply, access to the wallet can be lost, fraudulent schemes remain common, and regulatory rules can affect the market. Therefore, the choice of cryptocurrency usually starts with the most well-known assets — Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Solana, and Cardano — and they are evaluated based on personal risk tolerance.
According to Morning Consult, the gap between the parties changed as follows:
- Second quarter of 2025: about 11 percentage points.
- In the previous 12 months: 27.9% of Republicans and 17.3% of Democrats bought or sold cryptocurrency.
- Later: 23.6% of Republicans versus 17.7% of Democrats, the difference narrowed to about five points.
“There is no Obama coin. There are Trump and Melania coins,” said Eli Yokley.
Why It’s Not Just About Politics
Experts emphasize: partisanship is important, but it does not explain all the growth in interest in cryptocurrencies. Gender and age are equally significant. According to Morning Consult, about 74% of crypto traders in the US are men.
Eli Yokley links this to men’s greater willingness to take risky and speculative investments. The crypto market attracts investors who are more comfortable with strong price fluctuations. Young men stand out in particular — the same audience is more likely to participate in sports betting and choose other high-risk financial instruments.
From 2022 to 2026, men under 45 traded cryptocurrency about twice as often as women of the same age:
- Men under 45: 38–42%.
- Women under 45: 13–16%.
CNBC links the interest of young investors in cryptocurrencies to a broader trend: the popularity of meme stocks, leveraged ETFs, sports betting, and prediction markets. Some analysts call this “financial nihilism” — a willingness to play in markets where risk itself becomes part of the appeal.
At the same time, in recent years, according to Yokley, young men have become somewhat more conservative politically. Therefore, gender and partisan gaps in cryptocurrency partially overlap.
“The main takeaway is that the gender gap is much larger than the political one. But the gender gap is also politics,” Eli Yokley noted.
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