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318 addresses account for 80% of USDT circulation volume.

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318 addresses account for 80% of USDT circulation volume.

A recent study shows that out of the 318 main addresses circulating Tether (USDT), 80% of the USDT supply is controlled, including some major exchanges.

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Tether has been controversial since its launch in 2015, with previous reports pointing out serious trust issues the company faced twice, including being sued by the New York State Attorney General in April this year and issues with reserve audits, earning the nickname "Tether Mafia" on social media.

According to a report, John Griffin, a finance professor at the University of Texas at Austin, stated:

The concentration of Tether implies that the market dominance is in the hands of a few centralized players who can push up the price of Bitcoin, indicating that many exchange platforms are part of this profit game.

Research by Coin Metrics shows that among the 318 addresses, each holds at least $1 million USDT, with seven of the top ten holding addresses owned by exchange platforms.

RemarkBalanceAddress
Binance350,937,1041FoWyxwPXuj4C6abqwhjDWdz6D4PZgYRjA
Tether Treasury257,624,8441NTMakcgVwQpMdGxRQnFKyb3G1FAJysSfz
Huobi Cold wallet240,000,29035hK24tcLEWcgNA4JxpvbkNkoAcDGqQPsP
Binance171,483,9731H9HSzuzsV3R6fVHp9xPhVF9Z2mn3Lu3rP
Huobi69,136,2941HckjUpRGcrrRAtFaaCAUaGjsPx9oYmLaZ
Bittrex68,711,5141DUb2YYbQA1jjaNYzVXLZ7ZioEhLXtbUru
OKEX47,172,95337Tm3Qz8Zw2VJrheUUhArDAoq58S6YrS3g
Quarantined30,950,00016tg2RJuEPtZooy18Wxn2me2RhUdC94N7r
?15,599,99417BMxKwrLPPj5ZDyPnpgEvV6tomsmPLcbw
Kraken11,861,4993GyeFJmQynJWd8DeACm4cdEnZcckAtrfcN

Coin Metrics co-founder Nic Carter pointed out:

Major Tether holders include mainstream exchanges such as Binance and Bitfinex. Additionally, there are Chinese investors who need to trade large amounts of RMB and have high-frequency trading demands.

Compared to Tether, Bitcoin is much more decentralized. Data shows that over 20,000 Bitcoin addresses have balances of at least $1 million.

BTC QuantityNumber of AddressesAddress ProportionBTC Proportion
0 – 0.0011300431248.49% (100%)0.01% (100%)
0.001 – 0.01630464023.51% (51.51%)0.14% (99.99%)
0.01 – 0.1474572517.69% (28.01%)0.87% (99.84%)
0.1 – 120122207.5% (10.31%)3.53% (98.97%)
1 – 105996102.24% (2.81%)8.83% (95.44%)
10 – 1001375680.51% (0.57%)24.95% (86.61%)
100 – 1,000141070.05% (0.06%)19.75% (61.66%)
1,000 – 10,00019690.01% (0.01%)26.88% (41.91%)
10,000 – 100,0001040% (0%)12.07% (15.02%)
100,000 – 1,000,00040% (0%)2.96% (2.96%)

As reported by ABM earlier, Tether will expand to run on the Liquid Network Sidechain, meaning that USDT now spans across six blockchains, including Ethereum, EOS, Tron, Omni, Algorand, and Liquid Network.

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