A staggering amount of wealth remains on the blockchain, with some hidden behind anonymous wallet addresses and some traced to prominent cryptocurrency entrepreneurs.
How One Entity Controls 5% Of BTC
Satoshi Nakamoto reigns supreme as the world’s richest cryptocurrency holder, with $101 billion in Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) spread across 22,000 addresses, according to on-chain analytics firm Arkham.
It is widely believed that Nakamoto owns roughly 1.1 million BTC, making up 5% of the coin’s circulating supply.
If ranked on Forbes’ Real-Time Billionaires list, they would sit just below Microsoft founder Bill Gates and above Indian corporate titan Mukesh Ambani.
Note that Nakamoto’s real identity remains a mystery and they could be a single person, a group of people or something else entirely.
Justin Sun: A Crypto Powerhouse
Tron (CRYPTO: TRX) founder Justin Sun takes the second spot, with $1.80 billion worth of cryptocurrencies.
The China-born entrepreneur holds an estimated 1.84 billion TRX tokens, valued at $588 million. He also has a Bitcoin stash worth over $373 million as of this writing.
Forbes estimates Sun's total net worth at $8.5 billion. Note that this also includes his wealth from non-cryptocurrency sources.
Ethereum Boss’s Hidden Treasure
Ethereum (CRYPTO: ETH) creator Vitalik Buterin is ranked fourth, with $780 million in cryptocurrencies, predominantly in ETH.
As one of the project’s co-founders, he received a substantial amount of ETH at its genesis. Apart from this, nascent projects often send him unsolicited memecoins, hoping to attract investors by capitalizing on his brand value.
It’s worth highlighting that Buterin donates most of these gifted coins to various animal and health charities.
The Lost Treasure
While most of these entities can still access their coins on the blockchain, James Howells, a software engineer from Wales, has likely lost his 8,000 BTC forever.
His ex-girlfriend accidentally threw away a hard drive containing the Bitcoin stash, currently worth $740 million. It’s still sitting in a landfill. Howells has fought a lengthy legal battle to excavate the site, but with little success.
He said last year that he hadn’t given up despite repeated failures and would attempt to tokenize his claim./
‘Not Your Keys, Not Your Coins’
Like Howells, Estonian banker Rain Lohmus’s nearly $800 million worth of cryptocurrency stash remains locked away as he has lost private keys to the wallet.
He was one of the participants of the Ethereum Initial Coin Offering, investing approximately $75,000 to receive 250,000 ETH.
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