The word ‘whale’ is taken from the stock markets that refers to an individual investor or a financial entity, who purchases millions worth of shares. Whales are aplenty in the crypto markets making large transactions daily. This ever-growing rich list can move the price of a token with their purchases and sell-offs, respectively. Their investment power can make or break a token during the day’s performance and also cause a ripple effect.
Also Read: Why Does Bitcoin Even Exist? Explained!
How Do Whales Affect the Crypto Markets?
When a whale initiates a transaction, the sheer size of the purchase can make a particular token’s price head up. Similarly, if the whale dumps the token, its price would also gradually decline during the day’s trade.
However, that’s not the case for the majority of the time as the markets remain constant in the indices. Retail and institutional investors add more funds to the token leveling the playing field.
Also Read: Bitcoin Mining to Shut Down Globally if BTC Falls to $12,000?
How Much Cryptos Do Whales Hold?
Whales don’t have a central concentration of cryptos but they are divided into thousands of tokens that are available in the markets. For example, just 85 individual whale wallets hold 14% of all the Bitcoins out in circulation, data from BitInfoCharts shows. Also, 42% of all Bitcoins are held by 2,200 wallet addresses and are worth nearly $200 billion.
Similarly, one whale owns 36.7 billion Dogecoin covering 28% of all Doge in circulation. Also, 11 individual whale wallets hold over 45% of the overall Dogecoin circulation. Trading platform Robinhood is also among the top Dogecoin holders and owns 40.5 billion DOGE. You can read more about Robinhood’s activity in Dogecoin here.
In conclusion, whale activity in the crypto markets is not concentrated and is spread across the larger sections. Whales are available in every token depending on their market cap, which gives them the title of a whale.
Also Read: 3 Penny Cryptos You Can Bet Your $1,000 In 2022