Bitcoin Forum

The number of bitcoins owned by the richest holders is increasing as bitcoin grows older. Adoption could very well be a sham, because as a matter of fact the biggest holders keep accumulating more bitcoins, no matter how much bitcoin gets trader every day, this trend doesn't seem to be declining.

https://i.imgur.com/1I8a1WH.png
4.5m bitcoins are held by the top 500 richest addresses
15.5m bitcoins have been mined so far

Thats very strange. Maybe the one accumulating are not selling. But still i believe its the people currecny and it will remain for the people only.
Even if few hundreds holds major share, it still better the Fiat.

If they are not selling then I don't see what's the issue honestly , they can hold as much as they want but that won't change anything for others .
Having less supply will simply make our bitcoins worth more .

How is that info calculated? It seems to me like an impossible job to pull through.

Not only because of the pseudonymous nature of Bitcoin but also because many addresses belong to exchanges that hold the funds of many users.

just like with any currency of course the richest own the most.. its
a currency of the people because governments dont own it and print it imo

what is the source of this chart?

anyways the information can not be reliable when it comes to bitcoin. there is an anonymity with bitcoin and also the spread between bitcoin addresses that you can never make such conclusions and charts. nobody is keeping coins in one wallet so you can't find the real whales.

also, these top addresses are mostly mining pools, exchangers, services, .... that hold a lot of bitcoin because of the nature of their business.

Pretty sure that this chart is from http://bitcoinrichlist.com/, the information is accurate but might be outdated by a few hundred blocks because that site isn't updated that regularly.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle

There are several ways that the chart can be misinterpreted. The following must be noted:

• Addresses are not the same as people. Most of the top 100 addresses are used by exchanges and wallet services, and they hold bitcoins for millions of people.
• Counting the number of bitcoins that each person owns is like counting the number of dollar bills that each person owns. The results have no relevance. A person with a lot of bitcoins could still be relatively poor if all their wealth is in bitcoins, and very wealthy person could own no bitcoins at all.
• Most importantly, the chart is very misleading. the reason the values in the chart are rising is that the number of bitcoins is increasing.

That statement is false. 4 years ago, the top 500 addresses held nearly 40% of the bitcoins. Today, the top 500 addresses hold less than 30% of the bitcoins. The trend is declining.

What is the problem with that?

People who re already deep in BTC want to have more BTC. Sure, dont we all think that way.

BTW, I see BTC as a store of value, gold 2.0 and not as something I m gonna take into the shop and buy bread and milk with. I dont think it ll ever come to that point.

The chart doesn't mean anything. Most of the top 100 wallets belong to crypto-coin exchanges such as BTC-e, Bitstamp, Bitsinstant and Localbitcoins. A few of them are owned by the crypto-markets where crypto-equities are being sold, and dark markets such as Alphabay, Dream Market, and Valhalla. IMO, very few of these wallets are owned by individual Bitcoiners.

It's not false, this statement is in accordance with that the chart in the OP shows. The chart is from here (http://www.bitcoinrichlist.com/charts/number-bitcoins-owned-by-richest), a page which in its turn is sourced by publicly available data on the blockchain. The number of bitcoins held by the richest addresses indeed keeps increasing, but the percentage  (http://www.bitcoinrichlist.com/charts/percent-bitcoins-owned-by-richest)doesn't necessarily follow an upward trend.

This. To make the graph fair, change the number of Bitcoins held by top500 and top100 to % of available Bitcoin supply and you wont get increasing trend anymore.

Or this could be treated as most bitcoins are being held by Chinese people since they have control on half of the mining industry and trading transactions.

Do you actually know that they are being held by Chinese people/miners or is that just what you think is possible?
It is not great that so few addresses hold so many bitcoin, but it is probably preferable than that they keep dumping and keeping the price low!

I think some of the addresses will be old and now unused, others will be exchanges and ETFs, actual private people holding more than 10k Bitcoins must be very rare

Right now a huge percentage of the bitcoin is in the hands of richest person. If you take the entire count of users having more than one bitcoin, the count will be very low. This itself proves the statement bitcoin will serve to be a currency to a certain extent among the common man.

This is probably the result of news going around that majority of the mining industry is in China. There was also a rumor before that the big price pump when the bitcoin price rose to $500 was due to Chinese traders.

The accumulation of bitcoin is also an investment for the future. People have high hopes about bitcoin price and hence they are just accumulating it instead of trading or selling it.

That's human nature. Optimists will definitely accumulating the bitcoin for the future. For me, whatever the altcoins I get from various sources, I always buy bitcoins with that. That's accumulation for the future.

About the trading volumes, you relly on numbers which cant be independly verified these are not faked.

But the mining industry is indeed controled by Chinese pools, though many individual miners can point their miners elsewhere if needed.

BTW my Bitcoin holdings increase over time as well, although Im not in top 500. If you draw the number of Bitcoins held excluding top 500, you get increasing graph line as well !

only if there is enough demand, that is willing to buy at higher price, demand is everything, without proper demand, it does not matter if you hold if you don't dump big, if your coin is rare, all pointless, versus the demand

Most of these top addresses are not owned by individuals, so the possibility of having a big dump in the future is not very likely to happen

I disagree with you on this one. Just because there are some majority holders, doesn't make it to have less importance since functionality wise everything is still the same and regardless of how this could have indirect results in the market, there will be users all the time.

There is no concrete proof to show that Chinese miners contribute for half of the hash power. IMO, they will be in the second place, behind the Americans. And in terms of net holdings, they will be in the fourth place, with the United States in the first place, European Union in the second place. and Russia in the third place.

this does not prove anything. you can not connect bitcoin address to people and how rich they are. besides there are lot of other investments that are filled with whales.

that is strange, i think that bitcoin IS currency of people as many use them and people are happy to use it, people just love bitcoin because so easy to use and so, i think it will stay like that

and some people use bitcoins to earn profit, they use bitcoins more than real life currency like dollars or euros for trading, they use bitcoins only, so i really think it's currency of people

Where'd you get this chart? Do the ups and downs have any correlation to the bitcoin price? My guess is yes.

People who have alot of bitcoin will not sell their bitcoin. If they have large sum, it means they think highly of bitcoin. So therefore they will continue to hoard more. More so as the amount of bitcoin in circulation rises.

I am people and I use Bitcoin to buy stuff and I earn Bitcoin, that I can either hodl or spend. To me it's indeed a people's currency. I don't understand your point, I guess...

where did this chart and data come from ?
can we get down to the nitty gritty with the data and see what the top 20 or the top 5 have ?


be good to see the increases at certain times

1. If an adress has a lot of Bitcoins doesn't mean the whole amount is owned by one person.

2. Similar stories are told about fiat also. Remember? Something like this: "48% of the world's wealth is owned by 1% of the world's population."

Right now Bitcoin helps some poor people from India, Philippines, Mexico etc. to make their living, so it is the currency of the people in a way.

With not being the currency of the people, per OP? No problem at all, far as I'm concerned :)


With not being the currency of the people, per OP? No problem at all, far as I'm concerned :)


It's a semantic misunderstanding. The dirt-poor use fiat, which is issued by banks. By your definition, that makes fiat the currency of the people.
*OFC, the dirt-poor don't use BTC, because no iPhone with unlimited internet, and no one takes BTC where they're at, but that's another story.

Why are you here? Do you have Bitcoins? Do you have a problem with spending it? You can make it peoples money by simply using it, no matter what other people say. There are loads of people out there using Bitcoin. Join them!

Fiat is still mass adopted even though the richest 1% own 99% of wealth, no?

It is a fact that it is a large number meaning that 29% of total bitcoins are hold by top 500 addresses, but there are more rooms for other people to have bitcoin enough and the number of bitcoins keeps increasing which means it can be used by rest of people.

Yes, you are right but, in fact, what average people can do with Bitcoin now?
In most countries almost nothing, only use on Internet, to buy some digital things.
So, if they can't buy many things with bitcoins and offline just a few merchants accepts bitcoin (at least in my country) what average people can do with bitcoin?
Keep it in the wallet and wait for price increase?
In such game so called ''big'' players have much more experience and funds, so they can buy a lot bitcoin and wait a long time for profit.
Small people can't do this.

Why are YOU here? Do you have a problem with spending fiat? You can make it peoples money by simply using it, no matter what other people say. There are loads of people out there using fiat. Join them!


I think the argument around here is that sheeple were conned and bullied into using it by jackbooted government thugs, and there's no conning or jackboots in bitcoins.

Sure Bitcoin depends on some base technology. People need a computer, internet and if you want a mobile peer-to-peer you may need a mobile phone with a bitcoin wallet. Bitcoin is made for that. It's not for people in a small african village, where they even have no electricity to even run a pc. It is not for the poor children of the streets in Brazil, who struggle to have something to eat. It's made for those who can use it.

I think there would be a limit of distribution or creation of bitcoin to 21 million coins.



You are right, collecting or saving of bitcoin today is a good investment because there is really a possibility that the price of it will increase.

people like me and a lot of other users here and not here are using bitcoin, a lot of it is buying and hodling but there are a lot of spending too. and services are starting to recognize bitcoin like steam. so there it is currency of people.

and as for those addresses, as others have mentioned this picture doesn't prove anything. even if bitcoin is held by some group it is like share holders of a big company like apple.

It is no different than what is happening in the fiat system. Most rich people can buy more Bitcoin and some early adopters might even be normal average middle class citizens. They will eventually

sell and Bitcoins will be distributed. Bitcoin cannot change a situation that were created before it was even developed. Wealth distributing was already not equal before Bitcoin came on the scene. 

Bitcoin opened up the previously exclusive stock exchange, and people can now trade fractions of Bitcoin and make small profits. If someone wanted to buy Google shares or Microsoft shares, it was

basically impossible.. now they buy smaller quantities of Bitcoins and trade on a daily basis.  ;D

currency is diffirent with payment processor, now at this moment people use bitcoin as payment processor, like paypal system, the currency is US. dollar, and paypal is payment processor.

Bitcoin is just payment processor and the real currency is dollar based price of each btcoin .

Those number alone cannot truly define whether bitcoins should or should not be used by the people. If we look at those charts, we can only infer that those richest addresses are holding on to bitcoins as an investment or a business whilst people can use little amounts of bitcoins for currency.

That's the first thing I thought, too, but assuming it's true it's not bad for bitcoin.  There are 100 million satoshi in each whe bitcoin!  We need the price to rise 1000 fold and then it won't matter in the least if a single address has 10 million coins.

That's not wrong, but it doesn't explain the reason of unequal wealth distribution. I think the real factor that is at work both in the fiat system and in the Bitcoin sphere is a psychological one: The ability to endure delay of gratification. People that are rich vs. poor tend to differ in that respect.

Most people have problems (also with themselves not admitting to) with excessive spending behavior. You can clearly see that at the prevalence of credit card and other individual debt in the US. Most people simply can't resist the temptation to spend their money to buy things. This is the relatively "poor" majority - they spend more than their income would allow. On the other hand you have people that are "money hoarders", they are aware of their financial possibilities and are sometimes even ascetic when it comes to spending. This group of people has the highest probability to eventually become rich.

ya.ya.yo!

So you wanted bitcoin to be a communist currency? 1 Bitcoin for everyone? That is not gonna happen in real world.
As much I don't like that wealth distribution and I feel that is is wrong and cruel I know that there is little we can do about it.
Because you won't raid houses of rich people just because they are successful and better at earning money.

 bitcoin must be as well as all another currencies or as before gold and other metals...

Don't you see it? In our current economy systems based on FIAT, in fact every of them - either closed and regulated or allegedly 'free'.
There is wealth disproportion - and you can say that there is NO currency on earth which can be called "people's currency".
Were by 'people's currency" you mean currency with equal wealth distribution. Bitcoin is not exception here despite being decentralized digital currency.

Although the statement "the biggest holders keep accumulating more bitcoins" is true, the OP is implying that the distribution is growing more unequal, and that is false.

Here is the graph that is more relevant (from http://www.bitcoinrichlist.com/charts/percent-bitcoins-owned-by-richest):

https://i.imgur.com/sDC5rNa.png

As you can see, the trend is down. Addresses are becoming more equal.

Anyway, none of this matters because addresses are not the same as people, and the number of bitcoins owned by a person is not correlated with their wealth or income.

I think Bitcoin nowadays is growing up daily and even if it's now the currency of the people , in the future it will likely be if it's continue this success online and if the price get higher and become a little stable

Im pretty sure some miners sold some of their porfolio to recover their investment and now just accumulating the coins,making the market work out with the small holders out of the 500 top accounts of bitcoins holders,isnt nothing new that the top 100 are accumulating more and more soo they have some project to those bitcoins and some target till they sell if they are going to sell,maybe they interested in hold more and more bitcoins.

in absolute terms the rich addresses are getting more bitcoin, but in relative terms they dont grow that hard.

the % of bitcoin they hold compared to the % of bitcoin they held in the past is declining, and it will keep declining because unless they were already rich before bitcoin they can't afford to keep buying more bitcoin than everyone else combined.

also note that many of the large wallets might belong to cold wallets of large exchanges and other bitcoin services (like casinos)

Sad but true

Where did u get this information bro?

I have a feeling this is why the goverment is cool with BTC... they spent a couple million dollars to aquire a wallet with the potential of trillions of dollars. If they threw out the USD and went to BTC completely, they'd still be on top of the world! Kinda smart move... and they took down an illegal drug ring that gave cryptocurrency a bad name... not a bad job.

Bitcoin IS more concentrated by fiat, read 1% of the Bitcoin Community Controls 99% of Bitcoin Wealth (https://web.archive.org/web/20151117193125/https://www.cryptocoinsnews.com/1-bitcoin-community-controls-99-bitcoin-wealth/). What's written in the title is true, if you go to this page (http://www.bitcoinrichlist.com/charts/bitcoin-distribution-by-address) you can see for your own. Addresses with the top balance that are 0.77% of the total addresses holding a balance hold 99.69% of all bitcoin that has been mined up to block #410000. But that includes addresses containing 0.1 - 1 BTC which isn't a lot of wealth. Also companies with obligations to customers don't own the bitcoins they've accumulated.

Your posting makes no sense, but ok:

I am here at this Bitcoin forum because I am interested and I support Bitcoin as an alternative currency and, yes, I also use fiat.

Now: Why are YOU here? (This question should be addressed to the OP also)

agree with you. if botcoin worths more, people will try to get it. and I'm sure the rich holders will sell their bitcoins, so bitcoin will be people's currency. IMO

bitcoin is already currency of people anyway, many people around the world own bitcoins.

Yes, it is not the currency of people and we can say that people will not recognize it, on how bitcoin works, on how to earn with bitcoin.
And because it is a digital currency not all people are computer literate and still there are many people that doesn't know how to operate a computer. If they can't operate a computer how much more to understand bitcoin.  :-[

The graph would be more informative if it displayed the data as percentage of Bitcoins outstanding instead of just the total number owned and if it excluded the addresses of services which might be holding bitcoin in custody for others.

At any rate others have noticed that the topic itself is demonstrative of a significant Bitcoin flaw:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Monero/comments/4ih4m0/another_missing_the_forest_for_the_trees_topic_on/

I think bitcoins is the peoples currency and it is one of the best.

These 500 richest people are loving bitcoin, or it is also the possibility that these owners of that addresses are the biggest traders or exchanges of bitcoin and so their addresses gets the more bitcoins then any other.

Mass adoption won't necessarily mean BTC replacing fiat as "the currency". It has a long way to go towards general acceptance and stability. People will always have choices on what they would use and what they think best serves them. If BTC establishes itself as "the other currency", I'd be more than happy to live with that.

I think for now it is still the currency of the people, because there a lot of people using bitcoin and they used it globally, its normal that big traders and investor keep big sum of money but it will not change bitcoin existence

No one can change the value and usage of fiat money, because people are used to it. And for the long time people are more convenient in using fiat money, but still we don't have the same views and points.

There is nothing wrong with holding bitcoins and probably those who have been investing in bitcoins for years have the maximum number of coins in their wallets. However, people still are left with many coins which are still being mined. It has not harmed the supply till now.

You are answering way too far from the title of this thread, but yes you are right nothing is wrong today if you are going to hold.
There are also bitcoins that are lost forever in wallets that can't be retrieve and remember its private key.

That's how world works...
And the problem is simple, poor people dont know how to invest, they almost never hold money.

Any currency will be like that.

Nah, it's rich people who never hold any money. They invest it.
If you hurry, you can still make it to the soup kitchen for coffee and stale doughnuts.

Well this is to be expected to be honest. A lot of early adopters have gotten a lot of cheap coins and now their holdings can amount to millions of dollars. Also there are maybe some fiat millionaires who decided to buy into Bitcoin for the long-term investment value. The fact is that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and this pertains to Bitcoin as well. But I believe that Bitcoin can be used as a currency or a store of value and it all depends on the user.

Yes it's the currency of the people, do you think the smart people that saw the value of Bitcoin when it was worthless for 99% of people out there are aliens and not people? do you think they don't deserve it because they believed in the project no one else did? get a grip.

Also, eventually they will start selling, in the long long term the supply with get more even, but we still have a long way up for that, so get in while it's cheap and stop complaining.

This is probably a language barrier. By "currency of the people," OP means "currency of the masses." Technically you're right tho, as long as one human owns X and calls it currency, X is the currency of the people.

Well after the Panama Papers scandal ,I am not at all surprised that richest address keeps their savings in Bitcoin, its a normal reaction for anyone with a bit of a working brain. But still even with this happening, bitcoin will always be the people currency because of how easy and safe is to use it (of course when you know what you are doing) . So am not at all surprised by the trend continuing and not declining.

Fiat is the currency of the people. All people use it.

Fiat will always be the first choice of people and there is no doubt about that, but people who are tech friendly and loves to spend time online will prefer to use bitcoin.

I don't think.

Only if they gamble/can't score dope locally. For everything else, CC rule. I mean, think about it: your credit card gives you free loans and offers buyer protection, what's not to like?

By "all people" you mean the slave classes, rich and poor slaves both use scrip privately issued by their masters, yes.  

I'll bite, sure.  What "people" would choose a privately issued scamcoin as their first choice of exchange commodity? 

No, bitcoins is people currency only

The people who get paid in it and buy things with it. Because stores take it.
The people that don't buy digital tokens in hopes of becoming fabulously wealthy by sitting on their ass, those people.

what is the source of this chart?

anyways the information can not be reliable when it comes to bitcoin. there is an anonymity with bitcoin and also the spread between bitcoin addresses that you can never make such conclusions and charts. nobody is keeping coins in one wallet so you can't find the real whales.

also, these top addresses are mostly mining pools, exchangers, services, .... that hold a lot of bitcoin because of the nature of their business.

No, by "all people" I mean "all people," as in everyone in the world, including you, Wild One.

You don't understand. Those are the top 500 addresses, is fact verifiable on teh blogchain. Yes, rich people have more than one addy. That only makes Bitcoin wealth more concentrated, not less.

People who don't know what bitcoin is or don't have faith in it will never accept it as a currency but those who are using it at a moment also feels that it is the best investment to make.

Well from my decision most of the people taking BTCitcoin as secure investment and so many people have very strong believe in it and that is the reason it getting more higher value as time passing, in near future when it will go to mainstream than it will be much hard for a common person to get 1 BTCitcoin.

I think it can be the currency of it all but most likely it will not indeed because other currency's will also be in the future fully digital.

Hehe,
I don't claim to be in the issuing class.  Just a lowly dwarf.  But if you think the queen of england, the lords, cayman, monaco, zug owners, sultan of blah blah etc. etc.  take M0 fiat notes out of their pocket from time to time if they need to buy a snack, I'm not sure what you're smoking.  

I think it will take some time to become normal like fiat, people are getting more information about this innovation and showing very positive interest there.

No, I asked who would choose to get paid in it.  Your answer "the people that chose to get paid in it" is hardly very illuminating.  

"Stores take it" is also hardly illuminating.  People accept whatever they can in trade, we understand that :) the question was who would prefer private counterfeitable coins over public verifiable ones.   

I don't "take M0 fiat notes" either, do most of my banking online. Those digital bleeps and bloops are fiat too.
Smoking Camel Filters, if that matters.

Why would anyone chose to get paid in BTC, which they can't spend in 99.9% of the places they spend fiat? Or are you talking about that make-believe land of Equestria, where pastel ponies are happy to "transact" in Bits? 

American spirits here :)  So do you think the Queen of England, Saudi Princes, Sultans, or USA money issuers and massive landowners log into consumer banking accounts from time to time?  M1 is for us EBT card users, not for those who can add zeros to M1 balances at will.  

It will never be the currency of the people but it is the currency of some people and that is good enough. Bitcoin is never going to be on the level of the currencies of the countries.
But Bitcoin does not need to be that, it is good as the best online currency.

Because they're not a criminal and don't wish to support the counterfeiters?  Because they don't wish their assets to be devalued?  Because $450 is more that $1 ?  It's called Earth and you will find plenty of people are willing to trade things for other things here :)  You can negotiate the relevant quantities.  Equestria is a made-up place where people only accept as valuable what a small group of teenagers say is valuable rather than looking with their eyes at marketplace activity.  

I frankly have no idea how the Queen of England handles her finances. I'm sure she has many assistants (slaves, in your lingo) handling her finances.
One thing I'm sure of: She don't "store her valuez" in bitscoins. because that's just plumb stupid.

That makes zero sense.

I think it doesn't matter, because if you see most of the people are using the bitcoin for holding, so if they hold it for a long time or short time, so it doesn't take any matter. i think that's all are good for bitcoins, because bitcoin will remain in future. and that's really good for us.

I am totally agree with that. Governments don't own it and don't print it, but thie situation in the world is also affects on the price of bitcoin same as on the price of any other currency.

Yeah but they shouldn't keep collecting bitcoins and doing nothing with it. If they trade, it would not harm the supply. As someone said, I doubt the price may rise if the supply reduces and it would harm those wo want to sell their bitcoins as there may be less buyers by then. There should always be a balance as well.

And these 500 addresses are also from the people so it make non-sense by saying that bitcoin is not the currency of the people, it is up to us that we have to adopt it and after adoption it become our currency and we can use it on where we want to.

Bitcoin will achieve mainstream and become a currency as payment option the same way as paypal ,bitcoin over the years should become more stable soo its already a currencie for this comunity.

Choosing to be paid in bitcoin isn't about adoption. As long as bitcoin remains so easily liquidatable, it's convenient to use it for online payments and especially for user to user transactions. There's no bank holiday for bitcoin or bitcoin exchanges and there's no currency conversion fee for international transactions. If you had ever worked in freelance you'd know that getting paid in bitcoin is in many ways more convenient that most (if not all other) alternative payment mediums.

People who knows bitcoin and who are already using bitcoin knows the power of bitcoin, but we want that new users should also be a part of bitcoin community which will make bitcoin more powerful in future.

Yes it will become a currency for our community who uses bitcoin. But I think it would take more years that to happen, that other countries will adopt it people must be educated to know more about bitcoin.

>easily liquidatable,
As compared to what? certainly not fiat.

>it's convenient to use it for online payments
Not in the 99% of the places people typically shop online

>especially for user to user transactions
Not sure what that means. If you mean friends & family sort of thing, neither my friends or my family use BTC. Besides, if I need them to send me something, they typically trust me for the money.

>There's no bank holiday for bitcoin
There's no bank holidays for cash, CCs / ATMs either. Or do you mean for other stuff that banks do, like finance your house?

>or bitcoin exchanges
How does that make a difference if I need banks to get my money in/out of exchanges?

>and there's no currency conversion fee for international transactions.
No currency conversion fee for fiat either. If you mean sending money to another country and converting it to local currency, then there are fees, just like with bitcoin.

>If you had ever worked in freelance
When doing that as a kid, always got paid in cash. As an adult, was always asked for my SS#/sign bunch of docs/paid with company checks. As in paper. If I demanded being paid in bitcoins, would be unemployed.

By nature bitcoin is people's currency because it is decentralized and nobody contol it.Even if its larger chunk is hold by few,it is still available for everyone to buy,spend and sell.Hoarding only makes it price high which is good for bitcoin

I will just keep my bitcoins. The less bitcoins in circulation the higher the price will rise leading me to make more profit. So if they are holding the most btc let them as I will hold mine.

Better to keep that for sure while waiting for the upcoming halving. Why it becomes less circulations now? It is because most of us
are holding it and no one wants to spend it just to be sure that we can earn this halving.

As long as there are less people with knowledge about BTC, it will always be a currency for the few. Mass adoption is a long way to go. We should not just be happy with holding BTC, instead use it more to raise awareness and push others to accept it as well.

I agree with that, people needs to be familiar first of what bitcoin is, how to get with bitcoin, how to use it, how to earn it all necessary information about it. Many years will need to be in the process that bitcoin will become accepted by all people for their currency.

Bitcoin can act both as a currency and as a store of value. Heck everything can have the function of a currency if it has a value. What is the difference between getting paid in bottle caps or in Bitcoin if it has the same fricking value in dollars aka fiat? Who cares if the majority of Bitcoin is hoarded in the top 500 addresses anyways. What is the currency of the pawn shops? Things. Why do they take useless old things? Because they have a value. Now I don't expect Bitcoin to replace fiat as a global currency because things need to be pegged to fiat to have a value. If I can buy a sandwich with 1000 bottle caps or 10mbtc at the end of they day for $4.5 I will use whatever is more convenient. And because I don't want to haul a bag of caps or a piece of precious metal with me I use Bitcoin. In my honest opinion adoption has nothing to do with the debate of whether Bitcoin is a currency or not.

Yes, everything that has value can be used as a currency, though not everything that has value makes a good currency.
BTCridges, for instance, are valuable, though they make a shitty currency -- most gas stations doesn't let me buy gasoline with BTCridges, BTCridges are inconvenient to carry around without special equipment, people will look at you funny when you offer to pay for your coffee with BTCridge -- that sort of thing.

Same holds for BTC: doesn't work in gas stations, both you and dimebag Pedro need to have smart phones with internet to "transact," etc.
Actual money, OTOH, works great. A slightly long-winded way of saying that there are good currencies and bad currencies. BTCridges, as a currency, suck.

BTCridges do have a thing on BTC, tho -- their value is relatively constant, predictable from day to day. And this is berry berry important in a currency. Because a good currency should be different from a lottery ticket. Berry berry different. And actual money usually is. While bitcoin...
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/favicons/343743f96d656bcf5985ab6775f9edabc359e6a61b90f5d4ab46984a.png?6b4b7498fe0c37bb93068f6e5112c93f

I agree here. Bitcoin is a currency and if these big investors hold bitcoins, there are still many coins traded in the market and globally as well. It's just like the Government who owns maximum currency but the currency is owned by people too. It will never harm bitcoins/bitcoiners in anyway.

Well mate I agree that Bitcoin is not perfect in any way and it is still a 'niche' digital currency but my intention was not to state that Bitcoin is better than fiat in simple every day real life offline transactions because I am well aware paper money is still the fastest way of doing business at gas stations coffee shops etc. I meant to say that Bitcoin can be used as a currency when people see fit to buy stuff with it or pay for services. I am not forcing myself to use Bitcoin in unnatural situations just because I am a Bitcoin enthusiast - far from it.

Yeah, these 500 people are only the top in the rank and beside these there are millions of people who own bitcoin and are using it for their transactions as an alternate currency, and in the coming future it will spread to all over the world.

I agree with you, there are still many physical stores that doesn't know about bitcoins, and they are more comfortable using paper money. As of now, they need to know more about bitcoin if ever people who still don't know about bitcoin will shift into bitcoin , not actually shift but if they will going to accept bitcoin it is a good move for the market to adopt it.

Well you can never know. At the rate that we are going there is a slim chance and then there would have to be a depression or teh world to go corrupt for bitcoin to get an opportunity like that so as i said before the chances are slim

You have the point, of course when we are talking of money like bitcoin , a digital currency. If the government will know and recognize bitcoin many corrupt officials will also go into bitcoining and get their opportunity to corrupt easies than before. Since transaction of bitcoin doesn't need a personal information to process your request.

While I'll admit that it's worrying to see such poor wealth distribution, that doesn't seem like a good enough reason to abandon ship. People who've accumulated that much Bitcoin know that it'd be idiotic to try to sell what they have because they certainly didn't get where they are by being idiots. That isn't to say that it's okay for a few people to have this much Bitcoin, but it seems like an unavoidable problem. The best you can do is try to work around it.

of course honestly we will answer like this,answer that bitcoin is not better than fiat in offline payment,still become a problem for people to use bitcoin as simple as they use paper money,but dont you think this all only matter of time?i believe in future we have better technology,better economic and more comfortable to use bitcoin as we use paper money,i believe on it,hope its happen soon.

the chat carry no meaning, the people having bitcoin getting rich more and more. people have good option, it carry no meaning that if a person have many bitcoin he will earn more and more bitcoin and those who have less bitcoin will not earn, depending of the bitcoin you have .

That I must say is a little disappointing. Maybe the minority with all the Bitcoin are holding their BTC and refusing to sell it. However, I still belive that the BTC is better than the fiat system and will most probably become the currency of the future.

Wealth spread has never been fair. Bitcoin is definitely no exception here. Everywhere in the world you can see gigantic gaps between the elite of the world and we as normal people. It's only getting worse. To me it's not really a problem as long as I can live my life the way I do now. There is nothing I can complain about. We all should just focus on ourselves, because if you worry too much about the problems in the world you will not enjoy life as much.

Bitcoin is a currency, but now it has not reached most people as it only come in the digital form. Because of this reason of being only in the digital form bitcoin will never be the currency of the people.

People are not spending any Bitcoins they have bought with fiat money because they are scared that the price of Bitcoin may rise and they will miss out on easy future profits. As long as Bitcoin remains so volatile as it is today no one would be willing to spend coins when fiat is available. Bitcoin at present is mostly used as a store of value. When the price of Bitcoin stabilizes it will become more popular as a digital currency and few people will invest in it like they are doing today.

Thats the truth for the majority of normal users of bitcoin in general. I myself am saving in order to make some profit in later time as I believe the price will skyrocket. Well there are a lot of people who are using bitcoin everyday , but unfortunately the majority of this usage is in deepweb. Thats why bitcoin is not yet adopted by the masses but hopefully in the future it will be.

We just need to wait for some more time for bitcoin widely used and accepted as still majority of people hesitate in investing their money in something they really don't know.

i think this is a good option, as in my area i now alot of people who do discussion about bitcoin but still they are hasitating while investing in bitcoin. there fore its need a little more time to wait for.

not its not. bitcoin is the currency of the people and it will be for ever inshallah. i am very much hope and as i saw the people entering in the world of bitcoin it is really fantastic.

8)

how do you get bothered by just an arabic words? doesn't mean to offend you but seems you want to get this post getting out of topic by the way

I gotta second this on that graph exchange adresses are listed also.
And as exchanges grow on popularity, they have more users and more coins on their addresses.
So this graph is totally but totally useless.
Boooo

Who said anything about being offended? It's not just an Arabic word, it's a funny Arabic word, roughly "if Allah wills," or "God willing." It's this juxtaposition of spirituality and the profane, of God and Money, that I find particularly pleasing.

It depends on an individual how he looks at bitcoin, some treat it as an currency, some treat as currency and investment both, and some treat it as a best payment method.

This could be true.  Not everyone has extra money to buy bitcoins and there are many people around the world that don't have computers or smart phones.

It doesn't really matter. Majority of the coins are owned by the early adopters who don't have access to it anymore. The top richest address consist of mostly addresses from services and exchanges. This would be a good sign since it shows that the adoption rate is increasing.

Bitcoin can always be divided anyways.

The people who are not yet aware about bitcoin will never treat it as a currency but the existing users loves bitcoin and they will continue to use  it in future.

This is the only thing that i hate about bitcoins. Earlier people got a lot of advantage.

Yeah probably BTC is a great store of value for the next couple of years and more and more users will store their savings in BTC.

What if the people are horting BTC and wait until there is a better BTC infrastrucutre? As soon as I can pay with BTC in every store, also big whales will start consuming with BTC. Can you imagen what will happen when we all get paid with BTC?

The halving is going to embrace us with a big boost and every person who have bitcoin even those who have minute amount of bits will also earn some amount from their money, only those will not earn who do not have even a single bit.

Well you can never tell what can happen. I really hope that it does become the currency of the people. Everyone on this forum would really benefit as well. All we can do is hope now.

 :)
- There was approximately $ 1.46 trillion in circulation as of June 1, 2016, of which $ 1.4 trillion was in Federal Reserve Notts;
- The combined wealth of all the people of the world is $241  trillion  ($ 241 000 000 000 000 =  ¢ 24 100 000 000 000 000 ). (2014)
- Towards 2144 will be mined 21 million BTC                              (BTC               21 000 000   =    2 100 000 000 000 000 satoshi).

Seen from this angle, to some degree BTC could become the currency of all people, but I think this role will rather play altcoins.

It's important to note that the numbers you report here in fiat are estimates, are unverifiable, and have no physical meaning.

You  say "there are 1.46 trillion in circulation" which technically implies an error bar of 10 billion.  But there is no error analysis nor any reporting of how this figure is arrived at, and for very good reason: there can't be!  Anybody who imagines they know the total amount of bills which could pass as funbux through a bank without being suspected as created by the wrong set of counterfeiters is obviously deluding themselves. 

I think most of these rich addresses are not owned by individuals. they are owned either by a site - company or by an exchange. I do not deny that there are big whales holding big amounts of bitcoin. but is not as much as you think

It's possible that bitcoin will not ever be a mainstream currency, but I don't think it has to be. It can still be useful as a store of value and a payment method.

Easy to analyze for me because I am living in a shady world, bitcoin will surely brings the interest of the people who use it because anything that government would not support means a thing is valuable, remember government are corrupt and they can monopolize things but they cannot do it in bitcoin due to its transparency.

Well the title of the post is just a denial of what is happening with bitcoin. And maybe op is one of the haters of bitcoin.
But we can see what is happening now with bitcoin.

Even if this is the case, and we have small minority owning most bitcoins, so what? I am against plutocracy but what can we do?
Bitcoin is decentralized economy and anyone rich can purchase any amount of bitcoin he/she wishes.
Of course it will create situation where richest persons will 'own' bitcoin and it will be the same story every time with any form of asset - bitcoin is not sole example here.

True you are! Bitcoin was never a currency for the mass as it was limited to only tech savy people. Not everyone can earn bitcoin and more over, not everyone can understand the concept of bitcoin and hence they never felt interest in earning that.

I have briefed my office colleagues about bitcoin and they just laughed away. So I guess, only I am going to enjoy the benefit of bitcoin among my colleagues.

bitcoin is still in its early age at the moment in my opinion and it will have a really long time to go most probably though it will start growing really fast soon

i hope that bitcoin will be much bigger in the near future in this way i would be able to make some good money out of holding the money i already have, i think bitcoin will become great currency

It is actually a very serious matter to be looked upon as this number is gradually increasing and if they decide not to spread their coins out to the world, then I think we won't see a possibility for bitcoins to become a global currency.

You could say the same for every single asset and currency on the entire planet. There is no currency for the people. It always end up in a small number of hands without fail. I don't think it's a good thing but it's consistent with everything else. Bitcoin can't beat human nature.

Time change everything, opinions change as well, bitcoin might started as currency for tech savy people as you say, but future with bitcoin is same as gold, anyone with cash and will can own it, it is now easy to use, in a year or two it will be possible for a retard od IQ <60 to buy it with no problem at all

I agree when I look at hour chart:

But I have to say I still believe some big companies/governments will also the bitcoin scene, they will pump millions if not billions into bitcoin. If such a thing happens, eventualy the big boys/ whales will sales. Their only goal is profit, nothing more, nothing less. They don't care if bitcoin succeeds..

Maybe because not everyone get the idea of how bitcoin or other cryptocurrency works. But those who are aware of the capabilities of bitcoin maybe they will prefer to invest more of it as it is safe than the cash that we are using today.  As time goes by people will got interested and will be aware of bitcoins.  And I think people will slowly adopt to the idea of using bitcoins as another type or alternative for cash.

I do not see anything strange in it. The biggest bitcoin number holders are must be those people who invested in bitcoin in the most beginning. And as the price for bitcoin is growing their accumulations are growing as well. I just don't get enough your question that bitcoin is not currency of the people. How is that? You are man and me too, we are people and we are bitcoin holders, yes we don't have millions, but we have bitcoins. So bitcoin is people's currency. Logical.

no i am not agree with you, bitcoin is the currency of the modern age people and the number of its users and its invesators are increasing day by day, although it is also a fact that the importance of the fiat currency cannot be ignore in the present time but in future when people will know about the importance of bitcoin then they will start using it and it will become of the most uses currency of the world.

It’s kind of early adoption case. I am sure this scenario will change over the time when bitcoin will settle between a certain price range, that’s not possible right now because bitcoin is still in evolution. Everyone (or say most of the people no matter rich or poor) are acquiring bitcoins rather than spending because it has potential to grow further at very good levels. When bitcoin will be used globally and it will have a sustainable price for long period of time, we might see increase in bitcoin transactions. Now everyone is busy with acquiring more and more bitcoins.

It will be, but not so soon maybe a 100 years from today. ;)  People who were not into technology will not understand and will not be interested with bitcoins.  Just like me before.  People who live in some part of the world were electricity is owned by only rich people.  People who up to now do not know what a computer is and do not know how to use it.  If that would be the case then you are right, bitcoin is not the currency of people since only few uses it.  But maybe if given a chance that people all over the world would know about it, then perhaps it could go along the way even up to the time that it would be part of currencies that people used around the globe.