Bitcoin is largely controlled by a small group of investors and miners, study finds
Why it matters: Bitcoin and other popular cryptocurrencies are more easily obtainable than ever, but that hasn’t changed the fact that a small percentage of users still control the majority of the market. According to a new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) via Bloomberg, the top 10,000 individual Bitcoin investors control roughly one third of the cryptocurrency in circulation.
It can be difficult to differentiate individual owners from larger groups and exchanges that hold currency for many users, but the NBER was able to skirt this challenge by using a specific data collection method capable of making the distinction. What they discovered is that at the end of last year, the top 10,000 individual owners controlled about 8.5 million Bitcoins while the top groups oversaw closer to 5.5 million Bitcoins.
Digging deeper, the NBER found that the top 1,000 individual investors accounted for about three million of the 8.5 million Bitcoins controlled by the top 10,000 investors.
