ALBAWABA – Crypto investors from Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates have topped the charts with $350 million and $204 million in profits respectively by 2023, according to an analysis by blockchain firm Chainalysis, with no other countries from the GCC reaching the Top 50 global chart.
The $554 million generated in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates combined, however, is minuscule compared to the $37.6 billion in cryptocurrency profits worldwide in 2023, which is a substantial boost compared to the $127.1 billion in losses reported the year before.
Chainalysis stated “2023 proved to be a year of strong recovery for global crypto markets, with asset prices and market sentiment rebounding positively after the turmoil of the previous year” adding that “While this total is much smaller than the US$159.7 billion in gains made during the 2021 bull market, it represents a significant recovery from 2022.”
Bitcoin (BTC) has been revealed by Chainalysis to be the preferred cryptocurrency among investors in the UAE, the firm stated that Investors in the UAE saw strong returns from this asset class, which accounted for 70% of their total gains from the previous year, followed by Ethereum, which delivered 24 percent of gains.
“The community is clearly backing well-established digital assets with steady and proven performance, rather than backing more speculative cryptocurrencies. This isn’t surprising given that we have also observed that institutional investments by and large account for the greatest proportion of crypto transactions in the UAE,” said Kim Grauer, director of research at Chainalysis, adding that “The outsize popularity of Bitcoin and Ethereum indicates a level of maturity among UAE investors.”
