In 2021, the Bitcoin network moved into third place in the world in terms of annual transaction volume, surpassing such giants as American Express, Discover and PayPal.
According to NYDIG Research Weekly, the Bitcoin network processed more than $3 trillion in transactions in 2021. The first cryptocurrency is in third place, behind only Visa and Mastercard with a volume of processed transactions at $13.5 trillion and $7.7 trillion, respectively.
Researchers note that statistics reflect all types of transactions, including BTC transfers between users. At the same time, the researchers removed “transactions without economic substance” from the analysis. If the latter is taken into account, then only in Q4 2021, the total volume of transactions of the Bitcoin network exceeded $20.2 trillion. Bitcoin could catch up with Mastercard in terms of “transactions without economic substance” by 2026. This is according to data from a November report by Blockdata. The NYDIG found that Bitcoin’s transaction volume nearly doubles annually, while Visa’s payment volume is growing at about 10% a year.
