Bitcoin is the king of cryptocurrency, boasting a market cap valuation of more than $1.3 trillion. With this kind of valuation, it’s not too surprising that the balances of the biggest Bitcoin holders are truly jaw-dropping — we’re talking about billions of dollars worth of Bitcoin per wallet.
In this article, we will take a look at the Bitcoin rich list and try to identify the 10 biggest Bitcoin holders. Wherever possible, we’ll provide additional insights about each address.
Bitcoin rich list and top 10 biggest holders in 2024
Without further ado, let’s check out the top 10 holders from the Bitcoin rich list and learn a bit more about these Bitcoin whales.
Rank | Address | BTC holdings | BTC change (last 6M) | Dollar value | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 34xp4vRoCGJym3xR7yCVPFHoCNxv4Twseo | 248,598 | 0 | $16.4 bln | Binance cold wallet |
2 | bc1qgdjqv0av3q56jvd82tkdjpy7gdp9ut8tlqmgrpmv24sq90ecnvqqjwvw97 | 180,010 | 0 | $11.9 bln | Bitfinex cold wallet |
3 | 3M219KR5vEneNb47ewrPfWyb5jQ2DjxRP6 | 142,776 | +69,729 | $9.4 bln | Binance cold wallet |
4 | bc1ql49ydapnjafl5t2cp9zqpjwe6pdgmxy98859v2 | 136,295 | 0 | $9.0 bln | Robinhood wallet |
5 | bc1qazcm763858nkj2dj986etajv6wquslv8uxwczt | 94,643 | 0 | $6.3 bln | FBI Wallet (BTC from 2016 Bitfinex hack) |
6 | 1FeexV6bAHb8ybZjqQMjJrcCrHGW9sb6uF | 79,957 | 0 | $5.3 bln | Mt. Gox hacker wallet |
7 | bc1qd4ysezhmypwty5dnw7c8nqy5h5nxg0xqsvaefd0qn5kq32vwnwqqgv4rzr | 79,000 | +22,400 | $5.2 bln | Unidentified owner |
8 | bc1q8yj0herd4r4yxszw3nkfvt53433thk0f5qst4g | 78,317 | 0 | $5.2 bln | Unidentified owner |
9 | bc1qjasf9z3h7w3jspkhtgatgpyvvzgpa2wwd2lr0eh5tx44reyn2k7sfc27a4 | 75,354 | 0 | $5.0 bln | Tether cold wallet |
10 | 1Ay8vMC7R1UbyCCZRVULMV7iQpHSAbguJP | 73,090 | +16,490 | $4.8 bln | Upbit cold wallet |
Data as of October 15, 2024. Source: Bitinfocharts
The distribution of the Bitcoin supply by holder size has remained mostly static over the past couple of years. Image source: Glassnode
1. Binance cold wallet #1
Holdings: 248,598 BTC
Dollar value: $16.4 billion
Address: 34xp4vRoCGJym3xR7yCVPFHoCNxv4Twseo
The biggest Bitcoin holder is a wallet controlled by the Binance cryptocurrency exchange. Binance is the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume and user count, so it’s not too surprising that it has the world’s biggest Bitcoin wallet.
At the time of writing, this wallet holds a massive 248,598 BTC, which is more than 1.2% of all Bitcoin in circulation. It has been active since October 2018.
As a cold wallet, this wallet is used to hold the Bitcoin belonging to Binance’s customers for longer periods of time. The wallet rarely makes outgoing transactions — at the time of writing, the wallet most recently sent out a Bitcoin transaction about 8 months ago. However, when the wallet does send Bitcoin, the amounts are substantial, as high as 21,600 BTC in one case.
2. Bitfinex cold wallet
Holdings: 180,010 BTC
Dollar value: $11.9 billion
Address: bc1qgdjqv0av3q56jvd82tkdjpy7gdp9ut8tlqmgrpmv24sq90ecnvqqjwvw97
The second-largest Bitcoin holder is another cold wallet, this time belonging to the Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange. Bitfinex has was founded already in 2012, and has remained a pillar of the cryptocurrency exchange industry despite often being the subject of controversy (for example, the hack in 2016 and the criticisms of the Bitfinex-affiliated USDT stablecoin).
This wallet exhibits a similar pattern to the Binance cold wallet featured at #1 on our list. It very rarely sends out any of its Bitcoin, and when it does, the transactions are large. Occasionally, the wallet is funded with large incoming transfers—for example, it received a massive 50,000 BTC transaction in February 2020.
3. Binance cold wallet #2
Holdings: 142,776 BTC
Dollar value: $9.4 billion
Address: 3M219KR5vEneNb47ewrPfWyb5jQ2DjxRP6
Binance’s second largest cold wallet for Bitcoin dates back to November 2018. The wallet has received several major deposits over the years, along with quite significant withdrawals. As of writing this article, the address is home to more than 142,000 BTC. However, the total volume of hands that were changed using the wallet was 4,539,816 BTC, about a fourth of all Bitcoin in circulation.
It’s worth noting that the number of BTC stored in the wallet increased drastically in the past half a year, jumping from 73,047 to 142,776 BTC. Meanwhile, the wallet went from being the 9th largest individual wallet on the Bitcoin blockchain to being 3rd.
4. Robinhood wallet
Holdings: 136,295 BTC
Dollar value: $9.0 billion
Address: bc1ql49ydapnjafl5t2cp9zqpjwe6pdgmxy98859v2
The third-largest Bitcoin wallet belongs to the Robinhood trading platform, according to data from blockchain analytics platform Arkham Intelligence. However, as of August 28, 2023, Robinhood hasn’t publicly confirmed that it owns the wallet.
According to Arkham Intelligence, the wallet is actually managed by Jump Trading, who is acting as a custodian for the funds.
The wallet began receiving a series of large transactions starting in May of 2023. In each transaction, the wallet received between 1,600 and 1,900 BTC. The wallet stopped receiving these large transactions on June 30, and has only been receiving very small transactions since.
So far, the wallet has only made one outgoing transaction, sending a modest sum of 0.051 BTC in May of 2023.
5. FBI wallet (BTC from 2016 Bitfinex hack)
Holdings: 94,643 BTC
Dollar value: $6.2 billion
Address: bc1qazcm763858nkj2dj986etajv6wquslv8uxwczt
This wallet is currently under the control of U.S. federal authorities and contains BTC that was stolen from the Bitfinex cryptocurrency exchange in 2016. The wallet first became active in February of 2022, right around the time Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather R. Morgan were charged for allegedly conspiring to launder the Bitcoin that was stolen in the hack.
All of the large transactions that funded this wallet were conducted on February 1, 2022. Since then, the wallet has only been receiving transactions containing negligible amounts of Bitcoin, and the wallet has never sent out any BTC so far.
We’ll likely see this wallet make some very interesting transactions in the future as the investigation into the Bitfinex hack and the prosecution of the alleged launderers of the stolen BTC continues.
6. Mt. Gox hacker wallet
Holdings: 79,957 BTC
Dollar value: $5.3 billion
Address: 1FeexV6bAHb8ybZjqQMjJrcCrHGW9sb6uF
This wallet is controlled by someone who hacked the now-defunct Mt. Gox cryptocurrency exchange. In August of 2023, former Mt. Gox CEO Mark Karpeles tweeted the following:
“I hereby certify that the 79956.55 Bitcoins sent to the 1Feex address on March 1st, 2011, were transferred without proper authorization from MtGox’s original Bitcoin wallet and are considered stolen property belonging to the MtGox estate for the profit of the MtGox creditors.”
I hereby certify that the 79956.55 Bitcoins sent to the 1Feex address on March 1st 2011 were transferred without proper authorization from MtGox’s original bitcoind wallet, and are considered stolen property belonging to the MtGox estate for the profit of the MtGox creditors.
— Mark Karpelès (@MagicalTux) August 1, 2023
Apart from this massive transaction of 79,956 stolen BTC, the wallet has only been receiving very small transactions since. Interestingly, this wallet has yet to send out any Bitcoin despite being created all the way back in 2011.
7. Unidentified owner #1
Holdings: 79,000 BTC
Dollar value: $5.2 billion
Address: bc1qd4ysezhmypwty5dnw7c8nqy5h5nxg0xqsvaefd0qn5kq32vwnwqqgv4rzr
The owner behind the seventh-largest Bitcoin address is not known. However, we do know that some serious number of Bitcoin changed hands in the last couple of months – since the start of 2024, the total BTC controlled by the wallet increased from 59,300 to 79,000 BTC, an incrase of nearly 20,000 BTC (more than $1.3 billion at current rates).
8. Unidentified owner #2
Holdings: 78,317 BTC
Dollar value: $5.2 billion
Address: bc1q8yj0herd4r4yxszw3nkfvt53433thk0f5qst4g
It is not clear who owns the eight-largest Bitcoin wallet. The wallet first became active on March 24, 2024, when a whale tracked under the sequence of letters and numbers of “37XuVSEp” transferred 94,504 BTC to two wallets.
Breaking: A new Bitcoin whale wallet move has been tracked – the $5b payment has created a new whale wallet:
Whale 37XuVSEp accumulated 94,504.03 $BTC since 2019 ? ($6.1b)
The wallet sent all 94,504.03 $BTC to 2 wallets,
87501 to bc1qct3mys and 7453 to bc1qsetvcw
then they… pic.twitter.com/mOdOYlJQ9f— MartyParty (@martypartymusic) March 24, 2024
After the initial transaction, the wallet remained mostly dormant, receiving only small amounts of BTC periodically, probably from random Bitcoin holders looking to chase some clout for being associated with one of the largest BTC addresses.
9. Tether cold wallet
Holdings: 75,354 BTC
Dollar value: $5.0 billion
Address: bc1qjasf9z3h7w3jspkhtgatgpyvvzgpa2wwd2lr0eh5tx44reyn2k7sfc27a4
According to Arkham Intelligence, one of the leading blockchain research companies, the 7th largest Bitcoin wallet belongs to none other than Tether, the company behind the highly popular USDT stablecoin. The wallet received several transactions involving thousands of BTC from Bitfinex’s hot wallet account.
10. Upbit cold wallet
Holdings: 73,090 BTC
Dollar value: $4.9 billion
Address: 1Ay8vMC7R1UbyCCZRVULMV7iQpHSAbguJP
We wrap our list of the largest Bitcoin addresses with another cold wallet belonging to a crypto exchange, this time Upbit. The wallet has steadily increased its balance over the last couple of years and now holds nearly $5 billion worth of BTC. However, before crypto intelligence firm Arkham Intelligence identified Upbit as the wallet’s owner, many speculations had been circling about the potential identity of Mr.100, as the wallet became known in the community.
Who is Mr. 100?
Mr. 100 is a BTC address that receives 100 BTC at a time.
Many have speculated that Mr. 100 is buying BTC – as a large fund, Middle Eastern nation, or even a Bitcoin ETF.
We believe these assertions are incorrect – ‘Mr. 100’ is in fact an Upbit Cold Wallet. pic.twitter.com/92KMljoZ6e
— Arkham (@ArkhamIntel) March 16, 2024
Speculations about the identity of the Mr.100 wallet’s owner ranged from a random billionaire to a bank gearing up for an ETH move, or even wealthy Gulf nations quietly accumulating BTC.
The bottom line
As we can see, the Bitcoin rich list is quite fascinating. Of course, there are wallets used by leading crypto exchanges such as Binance and Bitfinex, but there are also wallets associated with unfortunate events from the history of Bitcoin, most notably exchange hacks.
If you want to learn more about Bitcoin, make sure to check out our article exploring if Bitcoin is a good investment or not.
FAQs
Who has the most Bitcoins?
The largest single Bitcoin wallet, which has more than 248,000 BTC, is controlled by the Binance cryptocurrency exchange. However, the largest holder of Bitcoin overall is likely investment company BlackRock, which holds more than 370,846 BTC as part of its Bitcoin spot ETF investment product.
In addition, we can’t forget Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonym used by the inventor of Bitcoin. According to some estimates, Satoshi could have more than 1 million BTC, although more conservative estimates place his holdings at between 600,000 and 700,000 BTC.
How many people own 1 Bitcoin?
There are more than 1,000,000 addresses on the Bitcoin blockchain that own at least 1 Bitcoin. Still, this question is impossible to answer precisely since the same person or company can own as many Bitcoin addresses as they please.