Why is the cryptocurrency market not as popular as the stock market?
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I would say that some of the main reasons are...
Crypto are non-productive assets
In the main, crypto coins are non-productive assets (although there are some exceptions). That is, they do not generate any revenue. Stocks (i.e. equities) generate dividends each year for the owner. So stocks have more of a concrete value, since they can be considered to be the present value of all future dividends plus any growth in those dividends over time.
Warren Buffet's view is that (decent) productive assets will beat unproductive assets, since you retain your initial holding but also receive revenue from it each year. Unproductive assets will only bring you value if you can find someone who will pay more for it than you paid for it yourself.
Stocks have ease of investment
It is much easier to invest in stocks than in crypto. There is direct investment in both stocks and crypto but you can also invest in stocks through managed funds / investment funds / mutual funds / pension funds. There are indexed funds that take out all the work of choosing individual stocks and there are investment managers who will manage your account for a fee. Overall it's just much easier.
Cryptos are high risk
The stock market is heavily regulated. Crypto is largely unregulated. There are higher risks with crypto investment that could cause you to lose your money, including:
- ICO scams and fake crypto coins
- Hacking, particularly of exchanges
- Generally very high price volatility
- High numbers of new coins, many of which will not survive
- Market manipulation by whales
- Potential for future government intervention and regulation
However on the other hand...
Crypto has potential for growth
On the other hand, the crypto market is still small and new and investors will be drawn by the potential for very high returns (or just like the ideology behind crypto). For those investors these potential returns outweigh the above risks and issues, making them prefer crypto to stocks.
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