Only 2% of addresses hold 1 Bitcoin or more — Is this true?

[lichig]

I'm curious about some publications mentioning that "only 2% of the addresses holds 1 Bitcoin or more".

I found this to be quite surprising, since I always supposed longtime hodlers to be the larger segment of the Bitcoin ecosystem and not just a small fraction.

How accurate this data could be?

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[iamsheikhadil]

I used to think similarly, but then again, these long time holders are very few in number when compared to today's number of people who knows about Bitcoin and holds it. In the early years, very few knew, but Bitcoin I would say grew up tremendously and introduced itself in mainstream in the 2017 bull run. Although I have known about Bitcoin since 2015 from some articles, I didn't really buy that time and many people like that exist. So, huge amount holders are really low in number as compared to today's Bitcoin population

[NeuroticFish]

How accurate this data could be?

There are places here and there offering lists with addresses that contain funds, so you can test for yourself.
However, this information doesn't mean absolutely anything, since some will keep all their funds in one address, while others will keep them spread in more wallets.

[cissrawk]

I'm curious about some publications mentioning that "only 2% of the addresses holds 1 Bitcoin or more".

Based on https://bitinfocharts.com/top-100-richest-bitcoin-addresses.html , there's more than 2%. Well, its on 2% range so its still count as on 2%.

How accurate this data could be?

Dunno, but you can take it as grain of salt.
Of course website that i mentioned above probably are not 100% accurate.

[lichig]

Ok — but, independently of the long-time hodlers, until very recently to buy 1 Bitcoin was a significant easy to access investment.

I'm surprised that not more people bought at the dip on 2019.

[stompix]

I'm curious about some publications mentioning that "only 2% of the addresses holds 1 Bitcoin or more".
I found this to be quite surprising, since I always supposed longtime hodlers to be the larger segment of the Bitcoin ecosystem and not just a small fraction.

Why would that be surprising especially if you think logtime holders would have more coins?
The 2% is exactly a reflection of old addresses having a lot of coins while millions of new ones only a few satoshis, those 2% hold more than 95% of all coins.

Understand what "or more" means, it includes addresses with 140 000 coins, how could addresses with over 10 000 coins represent let's say 1%? Their maximum number would be 2 100, that being 1% of the total will bring the maximum possible number of addresses with a balance to be just 210 000!!!!!

The percentage is normal, just like people with over 10 million in assets represent a tiny fraction of the popualtion.

[lichig]

Why would that be surprising especially if you think logtime holders would have more coins?
The 2% is exactly a reflection of old addresses having a lot of coins while millions of new ones only a few satoshis, those 2% hold more than 95% of all coins.

I'm surprised that not more people bought at the dip on 2019 for example, when to buy 1 Bitcoin was a relative easy to access investment.

[cissrawk]

I'm surprised that not more people bought at the dip on 2019 for example, when to buy 1 Bitcoin was a relative easy to access investment.

Probably because of some news and fud spreading around at that time. This chart show some event that happen in certain month and year.

[zanezane]

I used to think similarly, but then again, these long time holders are very few in number when compared to today's number of people who knows about Bitcoin and holds it. In the early years, very few knew, but Bitcoin I would say grew up tremendously and introduced itself in mainstream in the 2017 bull run. Although I have known about Bitcoin since 2015 from some articles, I didn't really buy that time and many people like that exist. So, huge amount holders are really low in number as compared to today's Bitcoin population

It will be really rare to find a long time hodler, there are a lot of price peaks along the decade that bitcoin has been around, and the people's psychology will be calling out to sell it at those peaks because of the FOMO on the peak prices because they didn't know that it wasn't the last time that the prices peaked and if there ever was a long term hodler from 2010 then I do salute him/her for having the patience to just hodl. To be honest, it is not that surprising to find that only 2% holds 1 or more bitcoin because if this data is new, this means that it has a correlation with the recent increase of institutional investors in the market which means that there are less bitcoin to move around for the remaining 98% that are definitely not going to get one bitcoin because it is expensive so most of them are getting only fractions.

[jrrsparkles]

I'm curious about some publications mentioning that "only 2% of the addresses holds 1 Bitcoin or more".

I found this to be quite surprising, since I always supposed longtime hodlers to be the larger segment of the Bitcoin ecosystem and not just a small fraction.

How accurate this data could be?

Even if this is accurate still it is completely normal though because number of crypto users increasing day by day but the total current supply is 18.5 Million even in that around 4 million bitcoins were lost due to the loss of private keys to their wallets then how can we expect everyone to hold more than one bitcoin.

[Fesatmas]

Maybe for the span of 2015 it applies, but from 2019 until now it has become invalid, where we see quite a massive adoption. bitcoin has been recognized by large investors, companies, and entrepreneurs. very hard to say 2% this time. well that's the usual bitcoin cycle we find from those who know what bitcoin is like, and how to get it. and even small traders have bitcoin balances in their wallets.

[stompix]

I'm surprised that not more people bought at the dip on 2019 for example, when to buy 1 Bitcoin was a relative easy to access investment.

Then don't look at percentages because they are misleading, there are 677288 addresses with a balance of over 1 BTC, and lower than 10 there are at least other 350k BTC in just three addresses that are cold wallets, it's highly possible to have a few tens of thousands of people with over BTC there also.
Percentages in this are misleading, I have over 1 BTC, but I also at least 7 addresses with early dust in it, I'm contributing to both numbers, the 2% over 1 and the 98% with less than that. If a shop received 50 orders and because of high fees it decided to wait a bit before batching all the coins into one new address there you have it, 50 addresses with small amounts that are inflating the numbers while representing just one user, and I could go on like this with examples like that till tomorrow.

Remember that in the end if everyone would start using bitcoins the number would be even smaller, probably gravitating towards 0.2 and then 0.02.

[saddampbuh]

wouldn't surprise me, an entire btc is worth more than most people's life savings

[pixie85]

It's nothing strange really.

(0 - 0.001) addresses are the largest group because those include change addresses. These addresses are made automatically when you spend coins from your main address. It means that if you had bitcoins for a few years and transacted many times time from that wallet you have a number of addresses with those leftovers within your wallet.

You are 1 person, but have many addresses that you did not intentionally make, some of which have 0.01, some with 0.001 and some with dust like a few satoshi.

wouldn't surprise me, an entire btc is worth more than most people's life savings

I read that in most countries about 50% of people have between 1 and 2 times their monthly wage saved up. It doesn't matter if the country is rich or poor.
Even in the USA a large number of people doesn't have any savings.

[philipma1957]

Where you live in the world matters.

In Manhattan having a 1-2 btc balance is nice but not a lot of money.

If you live in Vietnam having a 1-2 vtc balance is meaningful.

A penthouse apartment in Manhattan is 20k a month rent
Same style and size in Hanoi it is 2k a month rent.

But earning is less in Hanoi so I guess it is a balance.

[just_Alice]

I'm curious about some publications mentioning that "only 2% of the addresses holds 1 Bitcoin or more".

I found this to be quite surprising, since I always supposed longtime hodlers to be the larger segment of the Bitcoin ecosystem and not just a small fraction.

How accurate this data could be?

As for me, it's not that surprising, considering that most people aren't that rich to afford various risky investments. Also, even if we take large investors - it takes nerve to see BTC drop in price and still keep it on the wallet, also, many people are greedy and they sell just as the price begins to drop.

So potential longtime holders are either very rich people who don't care if they lose money, but if they're rich and not interested in profit - why invest in the first place? Just for fun, I guess, so we can't expect the % of such people to be large. Or, it can be ordinary middle to upper-class people, but for this kind of people, it must be particularly hard to see their investments lose value as Bitcoin drops in price, so many of them eventually sell.

[philipma1957]

I'm curious about some publications mentioning that "only 2% of the addresses holds 1 Bitcoin or more".

I found this to be quite surprising, since I always supposed longtime hodlers to be the larger segment of the Bitcoin ecosystem and not just a small fraction.

How accurate this data could be?

As for me, it's not that surprising, considering that most people aren't that rich to afford various risky investments. Also, even if we take large investors - it takes nerve to see BTC drop in price and still keep it on the wallet, also, many people are greedy and they sell just as the price begins to drop.

So potential longtime holders are either very rich people who don't care if they lose money, but if they're rich and not interested in profit - why invest in the first place? Just for fun, I guess, so we can't expect the % of such people to be large. Or, it can be ordinary middle to upper-class people, but for this kind of people, it must be particularly hard to see their investments lose value as Bitcoin drops in price, so many of them eventually sell.

I am 64 semi-retired and don’t earn huge money 💰.

So If I have a decent house in a decent town.
An income stream of x
A 401k of 4x

Having 4x more in btc is too much .



Lets pretend an example with even numbers.

100k income pretty much fixed.

400k  in a 401k in a moderately safe portfolio 💼

means having 400k more in btc is over investment in crypto for me. As I only have 100k income and cant save back losses very fast n my fixed income.

I would prefer

same 100k fixed income.

600k in 401k very safe portfolio 💼

200k in btc

A crash and burn 🔥 of crypto would not kill me in the second case.

But would really hurt in the first case.

[Cynthiajia0]

Checking the distribution of Bitcoin through the addresses provided by BitInfoCharts, there are 633,008 addresses with at least 1 BTC (a total of 1.68 million mined BTC), accounting for 2.18% of the total number of addresses. However, an address is not necessarily equal to a person, so a more in-depth study is necessary to obtain the true range.

[Theresajing0]

According to the distribution table, we can determine that there is at least 1 BTC between 500,000 and 1 million people.

What about the lost Bitcoin?

Yes-we should not ignore this aspect. If I hold 1 BTC and happen to lose the private key, do I still have the funds? not really. If we consider lost cryptocurrency funds, we should delete 20% of the estimated number. Chainalysis stated in 2017 that about 23% of circulating bitcoins were permanently lost

[sunsilk]

There is discrepancy for such data especially if it's about determining the percentage of addresses that holds this and that. An address will only be considered to be holding a bitcoin if it's publicly posted by anyone unless there really are researchers and companies who are good in digging data like unexposed addresses that hold from 1 bitcoin to more than that.

We only have 1 reference and it's bitinfo, I haven't any other reference that can give the same stat as them. They are including the wallets that have less than 1 bitcoin while the other websites that I've seen, they only are for the rich list.