Bitcoin has only 6 billionaires in the entire world, report reveals

https://fortune.com/crypto/2023/09/06/henley-partners-6-bitcoin-billionaires-world-new-report/

Almost half a billion people around the world have invested in some form of cryptocurrency—but only 22 of those investors have billions of dollars of those holdings.

In its 2023 Crypto Wealth Report, published Tuesday, Henley & Partners said 210 million people globally were invested in Bitcoin by the end of June, while a total of 425 million held cryptocurrencies of some kind.

According to the report, six—or almost one in three—of the world’s crypto billionaires reached that status by holding Bitcoin.

That means just 0.000003% of those who hold Bitcoin have Bitcoin assets worth more than $1 billion.

In the wider crypto space, 0.000005% of cryptocurrency investors’ assets are valued at more than $1 billion, according to the figures in the report.

Investors were much more likely to have gained millionaire status than a 10-figure net worth via their crypto holdings, Henley & Partners said, with 88,200—or 0.02%—of the world’s crypto investors owning cryptocurrencies worth at least $1 million.

Bitcoin has created a similar proportion of millionaires, according to the investment migration consultancy, with 40,500 of those invested in the most-widely traded cryptocurrency seeing their assets reach a value of at least $1 million.

The industry had also created a number of centi-millionaires—people with crypto holdings of $100 million or more—with 78 individuals deriving that wealth from Bitcoin and 182 gaining it from any form of cryptocurrency, the report said.

It’s unclear how much the individuals referenced in the report initially invested in the cryptocurrencies, or how much their crypto assets had gained or lost since they had held them. Henley & Partners did not immediately reply to Fortune‘s request for comment.

Which countries are most keen on crypto?

As part of its deep dive into the world of crypto investors, Henley & Partners also analyzed which countries had adopted cryptocurrencies most widely.

The consultancy found that the U.S. had the third biggest public adoption of cryptocurrencies, trailing behind the UAE and Singapore.

The U.K. and Canada rounded out the top five.

Henley & Partners created the Crypto Wealth Report in partnership with New World Wealth, using public information from major crypto platforms like Binance and Etherscan, as well as their own in-house databases.

The organizations measured public adoption of cryptocurrencies via the level of awareness, interest, and engagement in the general population. To score individual countries, researchers used indicators such as the percentage of crypto users relative to the total population, Google search interest, and the number of institutions in each location that offered courses on blockchain and cryptocurrency.

Crypto misfortunes

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are notoriously volatile, and being prone to wild swings in value has prompted warnings from the likes of Warren Buffett and JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon about their worth as investments.

In the wake of the collapse of crypto exchange FTX last year, U.S. regulators have taken steps to crack down on malpractice allegedly being undertaken in the crypto sector, suing Binance and Coinbase in quick succession earlier this year.

The legal action weighed on an already suffering crypto industry, with crypto assets across the board still reeling from 2022’s widespread selloff that became known as the Crypto Winter.

Last year’s downturn saw more than $200 billion wiped off the market in a single day back in June, with some experts predicting the phenomenon—which saw many crypto investors’ life savings wiped out overnight—could last through 2023 and possibly into 2024.

The spectacular implosion of crypto exchange FTX in 2022 led to some speculation over whether the world was witnessing “the end of crypto,” with some heralding the company’s collapse as the cryptocurrency market’s “Lehman moment.”

Bitcoin has recovered somewhat from last year’s lowest point, but at today’s price of just below $26,000 the digital token is still far from its all-time high of nearly $69,000.

Investors ‘shouldn’t put blind faith in crypto’

Carl Hazeley, head analyst at retail investor platform Finimize, told Fortune on Wednesday it was “not surprising” only 22 of the 425,000 people who held crypto assets had become billionaires through those investments.

“In fact, most retail investors actually lost money from investing in the space,” he said. “And ever since [the crypto winter], headlines have predominantly been filled with negative crypto stories and the collapse of prominent companies. This means the mainstream audience isn’t putting, and shouldn’t put, any blind faith in crypto.”

Hazeley, a former Goldman Sachs analyst who led the IPO of food delivery giant Just Eat during his time with the banking giant, added that investors determined to put money in crypto should be watching out for signs of real-world use cases that could lead to mass adoption, like central bank digital currencies and popular payments platforms integrating digital tokens.

“For those who are interested in individual crypto projects, coins like bitcoin and Ethereum seem to be a safer, more promising bet than early-stage projects,” he said. “That’s not to say you should throw out your digital coins immediately. It could be worth holding onto the crypto you have, just in case it ramps up one day—but don’t bet on it.”

The U.S. once made a request of Coinbase that would have triggered ‘the end of the crypto industry’ in America, its CEO says

https://fortune.com/crypto/2023/07/31/coinbase-ceo-sec-lawsuit-sue-bitcoin-price-crypto-winter-delist-crypto-assets-securities-brian-armstrong/

Coinbase’s CEO said a demand from U.S. officials to cease trading all assets except Bitcoin would have spelled the end of the cryptocurrency industry as we know it.

In an interview published Monday by the Financial Times Brian Armstrong, CEO of cryptocurrency exchange platform Coinbase, revealed the SEC suggested his company make the change while the agency prepared to sue the firm for allegedly operating as an unregistered broker.

Had Coinbase complied with the SEC’s request, it would have delisted every one of the more than 200 tokens it offers, apart from Bitcoin—the world’s most traded cryptocurrency.

This would have set a precedent that meant most American crypto firms would have been left operating illegally unless they registered with the SEC, according to the FT.

“We really didn’t have a choice at that point, delisting every asset other than Bitcoin, which by the way is not what the law says, would have essentially meant the end of the crypto industry in the U.S.,” Armstrong told the publication of Coinbase’s decision to reject the SEC’s request.

“It kind of made it an easy choice … let’s go to court and find out what the court says.

“They came back to us, and they said … we believe every asset other than Bitcoin is a security.

“And, we said, well how are you coming to that conclusion, because that’s not our interpretation of the law. And they said, we’re not going to explain it to you, you need to delist every asset other than Bitcoin.”

It comes following a row over how cryptocurrencies should be classified and as a result, regulated.

SEC Chair Gary Gensler has made it clear he believes most cryptocurrencies should be classified as securities—but has conceded that Bitcoin is an exception that ought to be classed as a commodity.

The classification of the assets determines which regulator—the SEC or the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)—oversees them.

In its June lawsuit, the SEC accused Coinbase of failing to register with the agency as a broker, national securities exchange, and clearing agency. It also alleged that some crypto assets offered on Coinbase’s exchange—including popular tokens Solana, Cardano and Polygon—were unregistered securities.

It came less than three months after Nasdaq-listed Coinbase revealed it had received a Wells notice—warning that it was facing a legal investigation—from the SEC.

A spokesperson for the SEC was not immediately available for comment when contacted by Fortune.

Crypto troubles

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are notoriously volatile, and being prone to wild swings in value has prompted warnings from the likes of Warren Buffett and JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon about their worth as investments.

In the wake of the collapse of crypto exchange FTX last year, regulators have taken steps to crack down on malpractice allegedly being undertaken in the crypto sector, suing Binance and Coinbase in quick succession last month.

“You simply can’t ignore the rules because you don’t like them or because you’d prefer different ones: The consequences for the investing public are far too great,” Gurbir S. Grewal, director of the SEC’s division of enforcement, said in a statement as the agency sued Coinbase.

Three months earlier, the CFTC took its own legal action against Binance and its CEO Changpeng Zhao, alleging that the company had violated the Commodity Exchange Act and operated an “illegal” exchange and “sham” compliance program.

The legal action weighed on an already suffering crypto industry, with crypto assets across the board still reeling from 2022’s widespread selloff that became known as the ‘Crypto Winter’.

Last year’s downturn saw more than $200 billion wiped off of the market in a single day back in June, with some experts predicting the phenomenon—which saw many crypto investors’ life savings wiped out overnight—could last through 2023 and possibly into 2024.

Meanwhile, 2022 also brought the spectacular implosion of crypto exchange FTX, leading to speculation late last year over whether the world was witnessing “the end of crypto,” with some heralding FTX’s collapse as the cryptocurrency market’s “Lehman moment.”

Bitcoin has recovered somewhat from last year’s lowest point, but at today’s price of just over $29,000 the digital token is still far from its all-time high of nearly $69,000.

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