Bitcoin Whales Found To Be In Control of the Market

An analysis of the bitcoin market has found that about a third of all bitcoin investments are being controlled by a small group of people. These people are referred to as bitcoin whales for how they take up much of the bitcoin industry and hold a large number of bitcoins.

The blockchain research group Chainalysis found that about 1,600 bitcoin wallets hold at least a thousand bitcoins each. Meanwhile, about a hundred of those wallets contain at least 10,000 bitcoin. This entails having at least $70 million in the bitcoin on each of those wallets.

The totals estimate that about a third of the bitcoin’s market cap of around $125 billion is controlled by that small grouping of people who have been investing in the currency. This in turn may cause the industry to be held under control by a small group that can potentially impact the value of the currency and change it around based on their purchases and sales of the currency.

The discovery comes as the bitcoin industry continues to be under fire for not being as democratic as hoped. The bitcoin had been developed to provide a decentralized financial instrument that anyone can utilize without risks. However, the people on the market who can use more of the currency at a time are likely to control the currency to where smaller investors are more likely to be subjected to difficult risks that they might not be able to support or utilize.

The concentration of owners will also impact the volatility of the currency. The smallest number of people will have the greatest impact on the price. The smaller investors are not going to do more with the currency. Some people have chosen to hold onto the currency as the “hodl” culture within the investment field continues to be a vital player in how it works.

The development may also be a factor of why the bitcoin’s value had gone up and down so much in the past year. Although the bitcoin had risen in the past year to where it had gotten close to the $20,000 mark, the value of that currency has since declined. This has led to the value being less than half of that total.

The currency is still being made available to people through various online exchanges and services. This includes working with new bitcoin wallet problems and even bitcoin ATMs to make what one might utilize a little easier for those people to access. However, the changes that come in the field from individual investors might be trivial in comparison with what may come along elsewhere.

The study shows that although many people are investing in the bitcoin, there is a chance that the currency will become tough for people to invest in and utilize. This all comes as the bitcoin becomes easy for many whales in the field to trade. The potential for the value to drop due to the sale of the currency by one person could be dramatic and threatening to many investors in the field.