Money Research Collective’s editorial team solely created this content. Opinions are their own, but compensation and in-depth research determine where and how companies may appear. Many featured companies advertise with us. How we make money.
Gen Z Is 4 Times More Likely to Have Crypto Than a 401(k)
By Adam Hardy MONEY RESEARCH COLLECTIVE
“The majority of Gen Z is still trying to figure things out,” says 24-year-old financial planner Dinon Hughes.
***Money is not a client of any investment adviser featured on this page. The information provided on this page is for educational purposes only and is not intended as investment advice. Money does not offer advisory services.***
It’s no secret that young investors are more crypto-curious than their elders. But new research shows just how popular digital assets are among Gen Zers and millennials.
For Gen Zers, or people who were born between 1997 and 2012, crypto is by far the most popular investment. In fact, a February report on U.S. investment trends by YouGov found that Gen Z investors are four times more likely to own crypto than a retirement account. Whereas 42% of the Gen Z investors surveyed reported owning cryptocurrencies, only 11% said they have a retirement account.
The trend holds true for millennials, born 1981 to 1996, too, albeit to a lesser extent: YouGov found that 36% of investors in this age group own crypto, while 34% have a retirement account.
The broad embrace of crypto — especially among young investors — is part of a so-called “second wave” of cryptocurrency, says Todd Dupey, senior vice president of market research at YouGov. At first, he says crypto was a bit of a “wild west.” But now, at least from a fraud standpoint, it has become much safer and more popular.
“Even larger banks and larger fintech companies are open to having [crypto] as a part of your portfolio,” he says.
Introduced in 2009, bitcoin has ushered crypto into the zeitgeist of younger, tech-savvy Americans and spurred dozens of other crypto coins, including ethereum, solana and dogecoin. In late 2024, bitcoin passed the $100,000 threshold. The Trump administration has signaled plans to relax crypto regulations.
In other words, once-niche digital currencies are poised to stay. Investing in them is easier than ever. And young investors want in on the action.
Why young investors are skipping retirement accounts in favor of crypto
Ask a financial planner whether you should invest in crypto over opening an individual retirement account (IRA), and you’ll probably be met with a lengthy, red-faced monologue.
Advisors often recommend a sort of order of operations for your money: Start an emergency fund that covers several months of expenses. Take advantage of 401(k) benefits from your employer. Open a Roth IRA. Max out a health-savings account. Then, maybe, dabble in crypto if you happen to have some fun money left over.
To be sure, that is sound financial advice. But to many Gen Z investors, it simply does not apply.
“The majority of Gen Z is still trying to figure things out,” says Dinon Hughes, a 24-year-old financial planner and partner at Nvest Financial, explaining that many young crypto investors haven’t started their careers yet and may be in entry-level jobs without access to 401(k) plans.
“With that foundation, which do you think a 20-something person is more likely to do on their own,” he asks — open an IRA or “make a couple quick bucks off crypto?”
For Yates Emerson, it’s the latter. A 19-year-old based in Maine, he says his buddy on his baseball team recently got him into crypto.
“Everyone has a friend that starts them off,” he tells Money.
Through investment apps like Robinhood and Coinbase, Emerson says he was easily able to sign up and invest $2,500 into various smaller crypto coins like XRP, Sui and dogecoin. He explains that he knows they’re volatile investments, but as a college student with little-to-no expenses, he doesn’t think there will be another point in his life when he can tolerate this much financial risk.
Emerson has nothing against retirement accounts. He says he plans to open one after college when he has steady income. But with retirement likely over four decades away, it’s just not a priority.
“Right now is the perfect time for me to make high-risk investments,” he says.
Access denied
For his part, Hughes says retirement likely hasn’t even entered the minds of many Gen Zers yet. The payoff is too far down the line to visualize. That isn’t an endorsement of crypto investing, but it’s the reality many of his clients — and peers — are experiencing.
Another major barrier to retirement savings is access. Aside from 401(k)s offered by employers, the main retirement savings alternative are IRAs.
Alas, setting up an account can be challenging. Some have minimum investment amounts; others require you to go in person. Then there’s an all-too-common snag: You have to choose where to invest your contributions. This is something many young investors have learned the hard way is not automatic.
“Want to hear something that will make you feel better about yourself?” said creator Kayla Caneat in a viral TikTok from 2022. Staring deadpan into the camera, she confessed that she put money into a Roth IRA every month for two years but did not realize she needed to invest those contributions in order to maximize their benefits.
“I never invested anything. I just deposited money. I never bought a single stock,” she said. Thousands of comments poured in. Many people said they had made the same mistake, begging the question: Why is something as crucial as investing in a retirement account so tricky?
Emerson admits he and his peers are, at least in part, drawn to crypto by the allure of big, short-term gains: “That’s just how our brains work when we’re young,” he says.
But if opening an IRA was as easy as setting up a Robinhood account and buying crypto, he says he’d probably already have one.
It's never too late to start investing
Earn an uncapped 1% match when you transfer or rollover a brokerage account, IRA or 401(k)*
- Invest in stocks, bonds, options, crypto and more
- Earn rebates on your options trades, including with our free active trading API
- Turn any idea into an investable index. Just enter a prompt, and put our AI to work
- Invest for retirement with a matching 1% bonus on your annual IRA contributions
- Earn 3.3% APY** on your cash with no fees.
Easy and automated investing, starting at $3 a month
-
Online banking that automatically saves and invests with no hidden fees
-
Earn bonus investments from thousands of top brands
- Expert-led, bite-sized courses to increase your financial knowledge
Get Up To $1,000 When You Open and Fund a New Brokerage Account With a Qualifying Deposit*
- No account minimums or maintenance fees*
- Invest in stocks, etfs, bonds, options and more
- Get investing insights from Morgan Stanley
- Available desktop trading platforms with customization options
Get up to $1,000 in stock when you open & fund a new Active Invest account1
- Buy & sell stocks with no commissions*
- Buy fractional shares starting at $5*
- Access to alternative investments, including commodities
A library of expert stock recommendations
- Two expert-selected stock picks each month
- Provides ETF allocation insights to balance your portfolio
- Access monthly rankings, 5‑year quant scores, detailed stock reports, and strategic “entry style” guidance
More from Money:
6 Best Online Trading Platforms for 2025
Why Investors Are Pouring Money into Bitcoin ETFs Right Now
An ETF for Every Age: Investors 18 to 35 Should Lean Into Risk (and Think Long-Term)
Adam Hardy is Money's lead data journalist. He writes news and feature stories aimed at helping everyday people manage their finances. He joined Money full-time in 2021 but has covered personal finance and economic topics since 2018. Previously, he worked for Forbes Advisor, The Penny Hoarder and Creative Loafing. In addition to those outlets, Adam’s work has been featured in a variety of local, national and international publications, including the Asia Times, Business Insider, Las Vegas Review-Journal, Yahoo! Finance, Nasdaq and several others. Adam graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the University of South Florida, where he studied magazine journalism and sociology. As a first-generation college graduate from a low-income, single-parent household, Adam understands firsthand the financial barriers that plague low-income Americans. His reporting aims to illuminate these issues. Since joining Money, Adam has already written over 300 articles, including a cover story on financial surveillance, a profile of Director Rohit Chopra of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and an investigation into flexible spending accounts, which found that workers forfeit billions of dollars annually through the workplace plans. He has also led data analysis on some of Money’s marquee rankings, including Best Places to Live, Best Places to Travel and Best Hospitals. He regularly contributes data reporting for Best Colleges, Best Banks and other lists as well. Adam also holds a multimedia storytelling certificate from Poynter’s News University and a data journalism certificate from the Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) at the University of Missouri. In 2017, he received an English teaching certification from the University of Cambridge, which he utilized during his time in Seoul, South Korea. There, he taught students of all ages, from 5 to 65, and worked with North Korean refugees who were resettling in the area. Now, Adam lives in Saint Petersburg, Florida, with his pup Bambi. He is a card-carrying shuffleboard club member.