India Holds the Crypto Crown — 3 Years at #1, and Still Accelerating

TRM Labs’ 2025 Global Crypto Adoption Index is out — and the message couldn’t be clearer: crypto’s capital is no longer Silicon Valley. It’s South Asia.

⚡ Quick Hits

• 🇮🇳 India ranks #1 in global crypto adoption — for the third straight year
• 🇺🇸 U.S. remains #2, with 50% growth in transaction volume in H1 2025
• 🌏 South Asia is now the fastest-growing crypto region — up 80% YoY
• 💸 India’s success: driven by UPI integration, retail investors, and a tech-native middle class
• 🏛️ U.S. surge: fueled by Trump-era policy shifts, stablecoin clarity, and institutional inflows

🇮🇳 India: The Relentless Leader

For the third consecutive year, India tops the TRM Labs Country Crypto Adoption Index — proving that this isn’t a trend, it’s a structural transformation.

With digital payments infrastructure, youthful demographics, and a culture of financial innovation, India has turned crypto into an everyday utility.

From remittances to savings, Indians use digital assets to protect against inflation, transfer money seamlessly, and participate in the global economy.

TRM Labs attributes this dominance to a perfect trifecta:

• A billion-user mobile-first economy
• Expanding developer ecosystems
• Cultural familiarity with digital finance through UPI and fintech

Crypto here isn’t speculation — it’s infrastructure.

🇺🇸 America: The Challenger Awakens

While India leads in participation, the U.S. dominates in volume.

Between January and July 2025, American crypto transactions surged by 50%, crossing the $1 trillion mark — repeating the same growth pace from 2024.

That’s not random. It’s policy-driven momentum.

Since Donald Trump’s return to the White House, web traffic to U.S. crypto platforms has jumped 30%, and institutional inflows are accelerating.

Legislative progress on stablecoins, ETFs, and tokenized assets has replaced uncertainty with opportunity.

As TRM analysts note, “Institutional demand is now paired with political endorsement — a powerful combination.”

The U.S. is no longer just reacting to innovation; it’s regulating it — on its own terms.

🌏 South Asia: The New Crypto Frontier

The real headline of 2025 isn’t just India or America — it’s the rise of South Asia as the fastest-growing crypto region on Earth.

Crypto transaction volume here grew 80% year-over-year, hitting $300 billion in the first half of 2025.

Pakistan is leading policy reform:

• In March 2025, Islamabad launched the Pakistan Crypto Council and plans for a Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (PVARA) — signaling the end of its gray-market era.

Bangladesh, on the other hand, remains officially anti-crypto. But underground markets are thriving. Citizens are using stablecoins and peer-to-peer platforms to bypass capital controls and access foreign exchange — crypto as survival, not speculation.

This regional divergence shows one truth: where regulation fails, innovation finds a way.

🧭 The New Crypto Map

2025’s adoption story marks a global rebalancing:

• India provides scale and participation
• The U.S. offers liquidity and legitimacy
• South Asia proves that necessity breeds innovation

Crypto’s center of gravity is shifting — from Wall Street to WhatsApp, from speculation to survival, from the West’s financial elites to the East’s digital middle class.

What began as an anti-bank experiment has matured into programmable finance for billions.

🧠 Bigger Picture

The crypto future isn’t a single movement anymore — it’s a multi-polar ecosystem:

• The East scales.
• The West stabilizes.
• The Global South innovates out of need, not hype.

The next decade won’t be about who invented crypto, but who uses it best.

TL;DR

• 🇮🇳 India tops TRM Labs’ Global Crypto Adoption Index for the third year
• 🇺🇸 U.S. crypto volume up 50% — now over $1T in transactions
• 🌏 South Asia grows 80% YoY, led by Pakistan’s reform and Bangladesh’s shadow adoption
• 💡 The global crypto map is now multi-polar, necessity-driven, and unstoppable