Why are crypto billionaires rising every year?
The adoption of the crypto market is increasing, which means that more money is going to various crypto projects. Due to the wealth potential, people invest in cryptocurrencies, leading to the rise of billionaires.
Many people have started investing in crypto because of the great success stories that can be found all over the internet. From cryptocurrency investors, who bought Bitcoin (BTC) worth tens and hundreds of dollars and chose hodl for years, to crypto whales who started a crypto-related business are among the key crypto enthusiasts.
It is feasible to become a crypto whale by trading well, building a business, investing well or already having a decent fortune, so that being significantly active in the crypto market with large corporations is possible. The crypto market is growing and every day, there are many opportunities for crypto investors and crypto whales to grow their assets and become crypto billionaires.
The crypto market is a very volatile market, however, which brings with it inevitable risks and opportunities. Despite this, money is finding its way to the many new crypto companies and relatively young companies developing decentralized applications (DApps). These DApps focus on Web3, the evolution of the existing World Wide Web.
2.
How many crypto billionaires are there?
In total, there are 19 crypto billionaires, but the future will tell if Satoshi Nakamoto and Vitalik Buterin are also among this group of wealthy crypto investors.
To determine what a crypto billionaire is, it is helpful to first define this term. A crypto billionaire may have earned wealth by directly investing in cryptocurrencies or crypto-related companies. The crypto market is relatively young, so there is also a chance that crypto billionaires have become so wealthy through a combination of both possibilities. Therefore, we do not distinguish between billionaires as long as they have earned their wealth through the crypto world.
Of these 19 crypto billionaires, almost all of them have earned their wealth from Bitcoin investments or their own blockchain-related companies. For example, you can find Alex Atallah and Devin Finzer of OpenSea, Chris Larsen and Jed McCaleb of Ripple and Brian Armstrong of Coinbase among the 19 billionaires. Vitalik Buterin, perhaps the twentieth crypto billionaire, could be added to the list, but his wealth fluctuates too much to be structurally included.
Of the 19 wealthy crypto investors, as many as 16 have United States passports. Because the identity of Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto is unknown, no one cannot determine if there is another seventeenth American crypto billionaire on the globe. If the unknown creator of Bitcoin turns out to be one person, then, of course, they also belong on the crypto billionaire list.
3.
Who is the richest crypto billionaire?
The CEO and founder of Binance, Changpeng Zhao, is the richest crypto billionaire. He has assets of over 20 billion and is among the richest people on earth.
The richest crypto billionaire is Changpeng Zhao, the founder and CEO of Binance, who is also known as CZ. He is said to own over 70% of Binance’s shares, and these shares represent quite a bit of value. Indeed, Binance is one of the crypto companies that owns a huge amount of BTC, as well as keeping the crypto millionaire dream of many crypto investors alive by providing millions of people with the ability to trade and invest in Bitcoin and altcoins.
In addition to its stake in Binance, CZ himself has Bitcoin in his investment portfolio. However, BTC is not the only cryptocurrency that CZ owns; he also privately holds a lot of BNB Coin (BNB). Following CZ on the list of richest crypto billionaires are Sam Bankman-Fried and Brian Armstrong, who are the founders of FTX Exchange and Coinbase, respectively. So, offering services that meet the needs of people in the crypto industry can be a profitable business.
In addition to these crypto exchange founders, there is one more possible billionaire, Satoshi Nakamoto, who seems to be the hodler of Bitcoin. With a total of 1.1 million BTC, Satoshi holds by far the most Bitcoin. Whether this huge amount of Bitcoin would be enough to depose CZ from Binance is still up for debate.
Not only is Binance also one of the parties that hold the most Bitcoin, but CZ’s total assets are also substantial. For instance, his wealth comes close to Mark Zuckerberg and Satoshi Nakamoto.
4.
Who is the youngest crypto billionaire?
The latest crypto billionaire is Sam Bankman-Fried, the CEO and founder of FTX Exchange. When the price of Ether (ETH) rose, Vitalik Buterin, the CEO and founder of Ethereum, became the youngest crypto billionaire.
Two familiar faces are fighting the battle for who is the youngest crypto billionaire within the crypto world. There are periods when Vitalik Buterin is the youngest crypto billionaire, but he alternates the title with Sam Bankman-Fried. Both men are more than two years apart in terms of age, with Bankman-Fried being the older of the two. However, age is not the most important factor, but the popularity and value of ETH is the deciding factor.
When the price of ETH rises, the value of Vitalik’s assets rises with it. This is because Vitalik Buterin owns over 290,000 ETH, which is by far the largest portion of his assets. However, when the price falls, Vitalik is no longer a billionaire. With a favorable ETH price, Vitalik is the title holder, but otherwise, the title of the youngest crypto billionaire is for Sam Bankman-Fried.
The owner of FTX Exchange has a wealth of over $22 billion. The speed at which Sam is growing his money has not only earned him the title of youngest crypto billionaire, but he has also become the fastest billionaire. This title was previously held by Mark Zuckerberg, the owner of Meta. Of course, Sam Bankman-Fried himself also owns the necessary ETH tokens and other altcoins, which makes his assets worth a lot more.
5.
Bitcoin whales: who are the largest BTC holders?
Satoshi Nakamoto has more than 1 million BTC, making him the largest Bitcoin holder. He is followed by the founders of Grayscale and Binance, who together have about the same amount of BTC as Satoshi Nakamoto.
When looking at the largest Bitcoin holders, there are a few parties that stand out. Of course, Satoshi Nakamoto, with a total of 1,100,000 BTC, has more significant holdings than number two and three holders of Bitcoin, namely Grayscale and Binance. These companies have over 600,000 BTC and 400,000 BTC, respectively, numbers that most Bitcoin investors can only dream of.
Behind these top three Bitcoin holders are the cryptocurrency exchanges Bitfinex and OKX, both of which hold over 200,000 BTC. Then, with MicroStrategy and Block.one, there are two more parties that own more than 100,000 BTC. Below the magic limit of 100,000 BTC are a lot of anonymous wallets, but also well-known figures like the Winklevoss brothers.
All these huge amounts are not stored in one wallet, but multiple wallets are used. For example, Satoshi Nakamoto uses about 22,000 wallets for storing his BTC, while Bitfinex and Binance both use a handful of wallets. In total, there are only five wallets where more than 100,000 BTC are stored, totaling more than 4% of the total amount of Bitcoin in these wallets.
It is important to note that a huge amount of BTC allows Bitcoin whales to create a buy or sell wall effect. A buy or sell wall effect is a significant buy or sell order that causes a sharp change in price. With a sell wall, there is a good chance that the price will fall hard, while the opposite can happen with a buy wall