$36 Billion Worth BTC are Stored by Whales: Diar

The accumulation of Bitcoin has significantly increased over the past year as 26 percent of the circulation volume now sits idly in different large-volume addresses, Blockchain Analytics firm Diar revealed.

Bitcoin is currently trading above $8,600, according to Coinmarketcap.com, almost similar to its value a year ago. The report detailed that the balance in Bitcoin wallets with 1000-10,000 BTC has increased by seven percent compared to the figure a year ago.

“Over 26% of circulating supply, $36Bn worth of Bitcoin, now sit in addresses that have a balance of 1000-10k BTC. In August 2018 when Bitcoin was also at $8000, these 'Firm Size' addresses held under 20% of the circulating supply showing a sharp accumulation of nearly 7% in less than a year,” Diar stated.

Eliminating exchanges

To include only Bitcoin hoarded by whales, the analytics firm excluded 96 addresses owned by Coinbase. Last December, the US-based crypto exchange transferred 856,000 Bitcoins to its new cold storage facilities. The sum, however, went down 11 percent and now the wallet addresses are storing 760,000 Bitcoins.

“A surge in the 1-10k Bitcoin address bracket in December 2018 was likely the result of Coinbase shifting approximately 5% of supply into new cold storage security facilities,” Diar added.

Interestingly, the number of Bitcoin addresses with funds between 1-10,000 BTC spiked in last December when the value of the coin was hovering below $3,500. Since then, these addresses accumulated 1.2 million Bitcoins.

The storage in retail size wallets, holding between 0-100 BTC, also saw an increase of 126,000 Bitcoins over the past six months.

“Overall, these [retail] addresses hold, as of date, 38% of Bitcoins circulating supply (see chart 4). Accounting for inflation, however, this segment remains fairly stable and unlikely the driving cause of recent price spikes,” Diar added.

The research firm also specified that all addresses taken under consideration are involved in active crypto transactions, which eliminates the possibility of including lost Bitcoin addresses with millions in holdings.

In an earlier report, Diar revealed that on-chain transaction volumes of Bitcoin hit a 10-month high in April after months of a declining trend.

Eliminating exchanges

“A surge in the 1-10k Bitcoin address bracket in December 2018 was likely the result of Coinbase shifting approximately 5% of supply into new cold storage security facilities,” Diar added.

The storage in retail size wallets, holding between 0-100 BTC, also saw an increase of 126,000 Bitcoins over the past six months.

In an earlier report, Diar revealed that on-chain transaction volumes of Bitcoin hit a 10-month high in April after months of a declining trend.