BingX chief strategy officer Kevin Lee says wealthy “old money” investors are taking a longer-term approach to Bitcoin (BTC) than many crypto-native traders, describing them as a largely untapped source of capital for the digital asset market.

Speaking during a Token2049 fireside chat with Cointelegraph head of multimedia Ciaran Lyons, Lee said he regularly engages with “a lot of old money” seeking alternative investments.

“They have stronger diamond hands than any of us,” Lee said, using crypto slang for holders who ride out volatility rather than selling.

According to Lee, Bitcoin has grown large enough that wealthy investors increasingly treat it as a portfolio diversification tool rather than an asset expected to “go 10x in two weeks.” He argued that their buy-and-hold approach could establish Bitcoin as a portfolio diversifier for a broader range of investors, although industry data indicates that adoption among family offices remains limited.

The comments land amid expanded channels for traditional wealth to gain exposure: US spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds began trading in January 2024, opening a regulated route into BTC through conventional brokerage accounts.

Wealthy crypto investors lean long term, but adoption remains limited

Some affluent investors increasingly cite long-term appreciation and diversification as reasons for holding crypto. Lee said Bitcoin’s growth has made the asset more viable as a portfolio diversifier, offering the example of an investor allocating 5% to gold and another 5% to Bitcoin instead of chasing rapid returns.

Recent data suggests affluent investors who already hold crypto are taking a longer-term view of the asset class. A CoinShares survey released Monday covering 2,230 investors with at least $500,000 in investable assets found that long-term appreciation and diversification were the leading reasons for investing in crypto, while short-term speculation ranked last. Bitcoin was held by 80% of the digital asset investors surveyed.

Still, crypto remains far from a standard allocation among wealthy families. A JPMorgan report published in February, based on a survey of 333 single-family offices across 30 countries, found that 89% had no cryptocurrency exposure, while their average allocation to crypto and digital assets was just 0.4%. Only 17% of respondents viewed crypto and digital assets as a key investment theme.

That contrast between the two datasets — broad Bitcoin ownership among surveyed digital asset investors versus near-absent exposure across family offices — underpins Lee’s “untapped capital” framing. Watching the same metrics in future survey rounds, from exposure percentages to average allocation sizes, would show whether that gap narrows.