Emerging markets accounted for 77% of Binance users in 2026, up from 49% in 2020, as users in those countries increasingly used the exchange for savings, payments and access to investments, the exchange said.
Binance Research’s latest report frames cryptocurrency adoption as a financial access story rather than a commercial story. Binance said that 83% of users who interact with two or more products on the platform are in emerging markets, while users in those markets show savings rates more than double that of users in developed markets.
About 36% of emerging market Binance users with balances of at least $10 have at least half of their portfolio in stablecoins, according to the report, which notes that the pattern is “consistent with savings-oriented usage.” Globally, 28% of users reach that threshold, up from 4% in 2020.
Data points to growing use of crypto platforms as substitute financial infrastructure in markets where banking access remains limited.
The World Bank says 1.3 billion adults still lack access to financial services, while 900 million unbanked adults own a mobile phone and 530 million own a smartphone.
Binance said 4.7 billion adults lack access to credit or loans, 3.6 billion adults in low- and middle-income countries do not use digital payments or cards, and 1.4 billion savers in those countries do not earn interest on deposits.
Stablecoins are central to the argument. Binance said transfers on high-throughput networks can cost as little as $0.0001 and settle almost instantly, compared to a minimum of $20 for cross-border SWIFT transactions. The World Bank’s Worldwide Remittance Prices Database puts the average cost of remittances globally above the UN target of less than 3%.
Indeed, stablecoins are increasingly used in emerging markets for remittances, savings, and cross-border trade, while drawing warnings from Moody’s, the IMF, and other institutions about risks to monetary sovereignty and financial resilience.
Data from Brazil’s tax authority, for example, has shown that stablecoins account for 90% of the country’s cryptocurrency volume.
