Cryptocurrency As Total Compensation?

For many investors, the terms crypto and blockchain have become part of everyday life and conversation. Since it jumped onto the scene in 2009, Bitcoin has become an overnight sensation despite the inherent volatility.

On Blind, the largest anonymous professional network, we ran a survey from Mar 1st- Mar 3rd, 2021, and asked over 1,800 users:

1. Do you trust cryptocurrency?
2. Do you own any cryptocurrency at the moment?
3. Would you accept cryptocurrency as payment in your total compensation?

According to data gathered by Blind, 50% of professionals trust cryptocurrency, and 57% own cryptocurrency at the moment. 90% of professionals at JPMorgan Chase & Co. and 70% of Goldman Sachs professionals say they trust cryptocurrency. Trust is notably lower in tech companies, where 52% of professionals at Amazon and 50% of Apple professionals trust cryptocurrency. 

Only ⅓ of NVIDIA professionals own cryptocurrency at the moment, while 64% of Bloomberg and 75% of Twitter professionals own cryptocurrency. 

This is not shocking given that Twitter has considered whether to add bitcoin to its balance sheet. A bitcoin announcement from Twitter may not come as a surprise to investors, as CEO Jack Dorsey is a passionate fan of cryptocurrency. He’s also the CEO of payments company Square, which purchased $50 million worth of bitcoin in October of last year, which represents approximately 1% of the firm’s total assets. Given leadership’s confidence in bitcoin, 3/4 of it’s professionals owning some form of cryptocurrency makes sense.

Most interesting in this data set is the willingness for professionals to accept cryptocurrency as payment in their total compensation. Typically total compensation is a combination of base salary, bonuses, and equity. 39% of professionals would accept cryptocurrency as part of their compensation. 80% of Credit Karma, 50% of Airbnb, and 47% of ServiceNow professionals would accept cryptocurrency as payment. 

A Facebook professional on Blind shared, “Half my wealth in crypto- It’s the future of money, and you’ll probably do it too someday. Is it risky? Yes. But I am highly confident it will pay off.” 

A different Facebook professional asked the Blind platform, “Best crypto to invest in at current prices- planning to drop all my bonus (30K) into a new crypto, which crypto would you put your money in at the current prices? Target is 2 year hold. I’m ok taking the risk.” 

An Amazon professional posted on Blind, “One of my concerns is that people who don’t understand blockchains generally don’t mentally separate blockchain utilization (e.g., cryptocurrency) from the underlying technology that makes everything possible (the blockchain itself). It’s concerning because if people don’t make that distinction, then the failure of one or more trending cryptos will cause people to mentally write off the benefits of the potential benefits of the underlying technology. That’s why I’ve been looking at investing in currencies that exist on underlying systems that I think are scalable beyond simple payment ledgers.

I might just be a victim of the buzzwords and sales pitches, but decentralized systems are really interesting to me. I’ve invested in BLOK and BLCN ETFs as well as SOL for altcoins, and they’ve done really well for me recently, but I’m wondering if anyone knows of any specific companies or projects that are doing promising work in this space” 

Do you own cryptocurrency? Join the conversation on Blind’s Blockchain & Crypto channel.