Exploring the Challenges and Opportunities of Alternative Finance Products with Indigenous Peoples

Indigenous peoples often invest in cryptocurrencies and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) despite limited research in this area. We undertook this research to identify the demographics of Indigenous Australians who own cryptocurrencies and/or NFTs and to understand the challenges and opportunities faced. In this paper, we provide an overview of how alternative finance is reportedly used in Indigenous communities globally. Next, we focus on 62 Indigenous Australians who own cryptocurrencies and/or NFTs and participated in our online survey. We found Indigenous Australians who had university degrees, worked full-time, and owned a home had significantly higher levels of NFT ownership. The reported challenges were mostly related to storage, and the opportunities were connected to the potential for cryptocurrencies and/or NFTs as a long-term investment. Implications from this research include a continued need for financial planners to offer advice in this area, as schools were the last place Indigenous Australians learned about these alternative financial products.