A meme began making its way around crypto Twitter earlier this month, pointing out that Bitcoin now has the number of active users that the Internet had in 1997. But the reality is even more interesting:
Bitcoin most likely has far more users today than the Internet had the year Amazon debuted on Wall Street. That means Bitcoin investors may be running out of time to capitalize on stellar market returns driven by growth in user adoption.
Our Sources: 70M Internet Users 1997 | 435M BTC Users 2024
#Bitcoin has the same number of users as the Internet had in 1997.
We are just getting started. pic.twitter.com/ppX1Vc9kZy
— Vivek (@Vivek4real_) March 23, 2024
The economics of this trade are fascinating and promising to investors who note that even if a billion or five billion more people adopted Bitcoin, there will still never be more than 21 million BTC in existence held on the original Satoshi blockchain.
That may have something to do with the remarkable rise in the digital asset’s market value.
#bitcoin pic.twitter.com/yiHCQBT6Bi
— José (@josebitcoiner) March 23, 2024
Bitcoin 2024 vs. Internet 1997
In January, crypto exchange Crypto.com reported there are 580 million crypto users worldwide.
An annual survey of cryptocurrency owners by Security.org consistently found above three quarters of owners reporting they own Bitcoin. So, there may be something like 435 million Bitcoin users in 2024.
Meanwhile, there were actually far fewer than 140 million Internet users in 1997. There were 70 million people online, though, the year the Miami Marlins won the World Series. 1997 was an important year for the Internet for many reasons. One of them was the Amazon IPO at $18.
A fascinating graph of the #adoption speed and arcs of adoption of various #technology in the US over time. #BTC #RDD #blockchain #beginning #telephone #telegraph #telemoney pic.twitter.com/i62FLtM4tA
— Jay “TechAdept” Laurence (@TechAdeptRDD) February 11, 2023
If you had invested $4,000 to buy Amazon shares during the Internet dot com boom in 1997, by last year, that would have become worth some $7.3 million.
But if you had invested it in the S&P 500 like Warren Buffett recommended to investors, then you would have had $20,800 to show for it last year. He has also warned investors to stay away from Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, and stick to the S&P 500 ETFs, much to the detriment of their returns.
Here is another one he would tell you to stay far away from in favor of his favorite Internet and computer businesses, AMZN, and APPL shares.
Internet Computer (ICP) 2024 vs. Amazon 1997
Bitcoin did it. Which crypto is next? pic.twitter.com/L4oareHbOu
— Altcoin Daily (@AltcoinDailyio) March 26, 2024
The Internet Computer just recently crossed $17 per network token on Friday, Mar. 29. With a market cap above $8.5 billion on Tuesday, the Internet Computer’s decentralized cloud is a rival to $1.8 trillion Amazon’s cloud computing business.
According to a report by CNBC, “analysts said Marketplace could be delivering $1 billion to $2 billion in revenue, which would work out to 3% of AWS total 2020 revenue.” Internet Computer hosts cloud services on its own network of devices built to various ICP blockchain standards.