Never mind

[Vald]

Never mind

[Swordsoffreedom]

I would say a whale owns at least 1000 BTC

That said the definition of a whale is someone who has a lot of money
By Fiat Standards a whale would be someone who has
300 to 600 BTC to spend in vegas at an exchange rate of $500
1000 BTC in Macau

From Wikipedia
A high roller, also referred to as a whale in the casino industry, is a gambler who wagers large amounts of money. High rollers often receive lavish "comps" from casinos to lure them onto the gambling floors, such as free private jet transfers, limousine use and use of the casinos' best suites. Casinos may also extend credit to a player to continue betting, offer rebates on betting turnover or losses, and salaries of employees may also contain incentive arrangements to bring in high rollers.

The definition of a high roller varies. At Crown Casino in Australia it involves bringing between A$50,000 and $75,000 to the table. High roller players often have very high table limits allowing the high roller exclusive use. Casinos compete on bet limits, in Australia limits of A$300,000 are common, in Las Vegas they are between US$150,000 and $300,000, and in Macau they are up to US$500,000. Only casinos with "substantial financial firepower" can accommodate high-stakes gambling due to the "volatility" of results.

[rikkejohn]

If the Whale is the biggest fish (okay mammal) then he/she owns a lot. It has to be enough to turn markets.

So ... hmmm .... we're talking a thousand just to begin to make a difference.

I think what we have are sharks, that join up to become a Whale.

Individually they are weak, together they have strength.

Then they all turn on each other.

*Edit - I'm saying about 10,000 BTC under control of one or more people with an agreement and strategy constitutes a Whale.

**Edit - Scrap that, I'm saying more like 50,000 BTC :-)

[kelsey]

In cryptos the term 'whale' is just used as an excuse for either getting caught with bags or to promote a pump.

[mymenace]

reports are magicaltux owns 90000

[Swordsoffreedom]

I would say a whale owns at least 1000 BTC

That said the definition of a whale is someone who has a lot of money
By Fiat Standards a whale would be someone who has
300 to 600 BTC to spend in vegas at an exchange rate of $500
1000 BTC in Macau

From Wikipedia
A high roller, also referred to as a whale in the casino industry, is a gambler who wagers large amounts of money. High rollers often receive lavish "comps" from casinos to lure them onto the gambling floors, such as free private jet transfers, limousine use and use of the casinos' best suites. Casinos may also extend credit to a player to continue betting, offer rebates on betting turnover or losses, and salaries of employees may also contain incentive arrangements to bring in high rollers.

The definition of a high roller varies. At Crown Casino in Australia it involves bringing between A$50,000 and $75,000 to the table. High roller players often have very high table limits allowing the high roller exclusive use. Casinos compete on bet limits, in Australia limits of A$300,000 are common, in Las Vegas they are between US$150,000 and $300,000, and in Macau they are up to US$500,000. Only casinos with "substantial financial firepower" can accommodate high-stakes gambling due to the "volatility" of results.

Great post, thanks for justifying your number, but I think you're off a bit.

In Macau, Gambling amounted to $24B ( http://www.heritage.org/index/country/macau ), since BTC is only about 1/3 of that, it makes since that whales should be too. So around $167K USD. Or 278 BTC at 1 BTC = $600.

278 BTC doesn't seem to high though considering that we have people with 10K+ BTC in the markets. So perhaps that 278 BTC is only the amount that they actually have invested in alts, in which case, the definition of whales becomes much more strict.

Thoughts?

In that case I would say that the one person I am really aware of that would classify as a whale besides the early betters on Satoshi Dice would be Nakowa or possbily Celeste from Just Dice who was able to bet up to 1% of the bankroll and created a rule change because to much capital was being moved back and forth

By that definition a whale in Bitcoin would be someone who is capable of making the casino take precautions to lower the risk the house faces by being capable of moving the variance significantly.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=242962.880

With around 222 Bitcoins but winning a few times that would be enough to be a whale.

[Penis]

1,000 BTC sounds about right.

A whale is somebody whose actions tend to cause noticeable shifts in the market. In the Bitcoin market, 100 BTC would be enough to achieve this, but most whales don't play with their entire balance.

[DubFX]

You can't define this kind of thing, how could you -_- this is retarded...it could be any ammount it's just metaphoric term.

[Amph]

100-1000 is a shark

1000-10k is a whale

10k+ is a megalodon

[r0ach]

In cryptos the term 'whale' is just used as an excuse for either getting caught with bags or to promote a pump.

such large kelsey fish much whale wow

[virtualdn]

i wanna be a barracuda

[beaknuke]

so where's the Whale jokes? like Whale sat a bar.. etc

[Lorenzo]

I would say a whale owns at least 1000 BTC

That said the definition of a whale is someone who has a lot of money
By Fiat Standards a whale would be someone who has
300 to 600 BTC to spend in vegas at an exchange rate of $500
1000 BTC in Macau

From Wikipedia
A high roller, also referred to as a whale in the casino industry, is a gambler who wagers large amounts of money. High rollers often receive lavish "comps" from casinos to lure them onto the gambling floors, such as free private jet transfers, limousine use and use of the casinos' best suites. Casinos may also extend credit to a player to continue betting, offer rebates on betting turnover or losses, and salaries of employees may also contain incentive arrangements to bring in high rollers.

The definition of a high roller varies. At Crown Casino in Australia it involves bringing between A$50,000 and $75,000 to the table. High roller players often have very high table limits allowing the high roller exclusive use. Casinos compete on bet limits, in Australia limits of A$300,000 are common, in Las Vegas they are between US$150,000 and $300,000, and in Macau they are up to US$500,000. Only casinos with "substantial financial firepower" can accommodate high-stakes gambling due to the "volatility" of results.

Interesting. I always assumed it was an invention by the Bitcoin community. Kind of like "hodl", "new wealthy elite", "to the moon", "goxxed", etc.

[upekha]

one NEMstake

[KIRAZ]

Yup, 1000 and we can it a whale, that's some pretty insane amount of btc one can hold atm.

[rikkejohn]

1,000 is not that much, spread across a few exchanges.

There are near to 13,000,000 BTC, and more appearing each day.

A Whale would have to have access to a substantial proportion of that. Someone with 1,000 BTC is just someone with a lot of BTC

Karpeles, BTC-e, Silk Road (of old) were Whales.

A Whale moves the market at will. He/she would have only a few competitors. They will be in cahoots, although they will all be shit scared of being out-manoeuvred by the others.  

[Godye Sclaro X9]

1,000 is not that much, spread across a few exchanges.

There are near to 13,000,000 BTC, and more appearing each day.

A Whale would have to have access to a substantial proportion of that. Someone with 1,000 BTC is just someone with a lot of BTC

Karpeles, BTC-e, Silk Road (of old) were Whales.

A Whale moves the market at will. He/she would have only a few competitors. They will be in cahoots, although they will all be shit scared of being out-manoeuvred by the others.  

Only a fraction of that 13 million is actually in exchanges at any given time however.

[Mayuyu48]

whales at least have 20-25% BTC from daily volume on exchange
around 1000~1200 BTC will enough to manipulate markets
i don't think they are not from newly investor of BTC, maybe from early adopters who own many bitcoins
anyone knows how many BTC that whales need to move price from $1xx to $1000 last year?

[LiteCoinGuy]

for example: Jeff owns 350.000 BTC....guess roger ver has also 300k - 500k.

so your 1000 is nothing 

[ChekaZ]

100-1000 is a shark

1000-10k is a whale

10k+ is a megalodon

Haha, I like that