Who are the Bitcoin “whales”? Since 2009, the queen of crypto has seen people, companies and addresses accumulate so many BTC that an up-to-date world ranking has been compiled.
Satoshi Nakamoto, Changpeng Zhao and MicroStrategy are at the top of this category.
Who holds the most Bitcoin in the world? The distribution of BTC
Bitcoin’s blockchain allows everyone to view the distribution of BTC and discover that just over 90% of the existing addresses contain less than 0.01 BTC, while 6% of the Bitcoin supply is in the hands of just 10 addresses.
This is why when people talk about who holds the most Bitcoin in the world they refer to whales, namely those investors who hold so many BTC that when they move them, they are able to “manoeuvre” the market.
At the very top, of course, can only be the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto who holds an impressive 1.1 million BTC, over 6% of all Bitcoin created to date.
Other single public addresses containing amounts greater than 250,000 BTC are the exchanges Huobi, which owns 1.41% of the units in circulation, and Binance with 1.33%.
Top 3 richest people thanks to Bitcoin and crypto
According to Forbes, there is an updated 2022 ranking of the richest people in the world thanks to Bitcoin and crypto.
In first place is Changpeng Zhao or CZ, the CEO and founder of Binance, the industry’s most popular crypto exchange. CZ has a net worth of $65 billion and is the 19th richest person in the world.
In second place is Sam Bankman-Fried, born in 1992, founder and CEO of crypto exchange FTX and of Alameda Research, a quantitative trading company. His net worth amounts to $24 billion.
Also on the podium of the richest people thanks to Bitcoin and crypto is Brian Armstrong, founder and CEO of Coinbase, with a net worth of $6.6 billion.
The ranking of the companies that hold the most BTC in the world
According to Bitcoin Treasury, it is possible to have a ranking of the listed companies that hold the most Bitcoin in the world.
In first place is MicroStrategy, a software company that provides business intelligence and cloud-based services, with 129,218 BTC. Its CEO Michael Saylor is famous for his BTC hoarding strategy, recently obtaining a $205 million loan to buy more BTC.
Next is Tesla, which owns 42,902 BTC, with its famous CEO Elon Musk who affected the crypto market for a while through his tweets.
Another believer in Bitcoin is Square, Jack Dorsey‘s digital payments company, which takes sixth place in the ranking with 8,027 BTC.
In which countries is Bitcoin legal tender?
Organizations, people and companies, the ranking of who holds the most Bitcoin in the world can also be extended to countries, as there are two in the world that have made BTC legal tender.
In first place is El Salvador, which since September 2021 has added Bitcoin to the US dollar as the country’s second legal tender.
Right behind is the Central African Republic (CAR), a medium-sized Central African state with less than 6 million inhabitants.
Source: https://en.cryptonomist.ch/2022/05/21/most-bitcoin-world-top-category/