Will ADA Whales Ever Give Up Their Power?

Can you pinpoint the address of upbit? i see you only mention binance, byt 80% of the volume is in korea atm…

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@Adafans_io It’s easy to see all the exchange addresses with the AdaTracker rich list because they’re the addresses that have 100s of transactions associated with them. It’s not clear exactly which of those addresses is Upbit, but it’s absolutely clear which addresses are exchange addresses. So, based on that clarity, we can see that Upbit’s total share is tiny compared to even Binance, which only has 3.7% of the total ADA wealth.

Additionally, we know from the audit report that the voucher sale was offered only to a very small group, with 95% of the buyers based in Japan. What more proof do you need to confirm that the ADA concentration is very high? :slight_smile:

I only see 4 address with over 100tx https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/cardano/#markets - should be a little more then thhat :wink:

That’s because none of the other exchanges have enough volume to even be displayed in the top-100 rich list. That’s why I’ve been saying that all the other exchanges represent only a tiny portion of the total ADA wealth right now compared to the off-exchange whale portion. So they’re irrelevant to this issue because they’re not the cause of the ADA concentration.

Smth is still wrong… ok lets look here at tx nr - https://adatracker.com/charts and let’s agree the only reason to tx is to move from the exchange to daedalus or the other way around. So we have epoch 17 with 40 000 tx - but your rich list of what you say is “all exchanges” - dont have anything near this

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Those transactions are the thousands of late comers to the party buying and moving their petty ADA holdings between exchanges and wallet. Remember, back in Dec/Jan when it went to $1.20 or whatever and everyone including your hairdresser bought in - that’s that.

Be real, this project was initiated for a small number of people back in 2015, they paid for it, they own it, and they always will. You are window dressing.

@Adafans_io Up to this point, I assumed that @Lovelacepool’s identification of Binance as the third highest balance in the rich list (now it’s the second highest balance at this moment) was correct. However, after thinking about your comments and looking at the CoinMarketCap list, it seems pretty obvious that Upbit should have a higher balance than Binance because Upbit’s tx volume is about 8.5x larger than Binance’s volume.

So, I think I understand your point now and I don’t think the 2nd/3rd highest balance in the Rich List is owned by Binance anymore (It must be Upbit). However, that swap of the exchange-address pairs doesn’t change the fundamental reality: All exchange addresses collectively represent a tiny portion of the total ADA wealth–less than 5%.

Also, just to make sure we’re all on the same page: The data that is measured in the AdaTracker epoch chart is totally different from what is measured in the Rich List. For example, each epoch lasts for 20 hours; and within each epoch you can have many thousands of transactions (e.g., 40k in epoch 17), which includes all the exchanges and individual wallet transactions. Within each epoch you have many addresses executing transactions. But those transactions appear in the Rich List only if they are associated with an address that has a very high top-100 ADA balance. Thus, the Rich List helps us see the volume of transactions and total ADA balance attached to each of the top-100 balance addresses.

Since we know that only an exchange would have 100s of transactions, and there are only a few addresses in the top-100 Rich List that have 100s of transactions, we can reasonably infer that there are only a few exchanges that actually have high ADA balances. Thus, all the collective exchange balances represent only less than 5% of the total ADA wealth right now.

Another useful point is this: Volume is not the same as ADA balance. CoinMarketCap only displays daily volume, which has nothing to do with the actual ADA balance at any of those exchanges. In fact, the volume at most of those exchanges is very small. And since most ADA holders are smart enough to keep their ADA off the exchanges (especially in Japan where Mt. Gox collapsed), we can reasonably expect that exchange-based ADA balances are very small, which is confirmed in the Rich List.

I wonder if this is why the price slides sideways, while the other cryptos rise, even though the tech and team is so much better. Everyone who owns BTC mined it, or bought it at market. But these guys bought it for $0.002 in 2015, they will want to realize some of that gain, so you have a long queue of people with practically infinite tokens constantly trickle selling. Just a thought.

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On the bright side, let’s not forget that “the Japanese are born hodlers, two decades of low-interest rates could not move them” as Chainomatic states, so I tend to think that they will not massively and collectively sell in the coming years, unless maybe if the price starts to reach highs such as 100$-500$ + (which I honestly don’t think possible), and even at those prices, I don’t think the Japanese will sell. They are in to create wealth for generations, it’s in their mentality. And they are the majority, so I’m not worried at all.


As you can see the average price was 317-519 satoshi same as the first month on bittrex STOP SPREADING CHEAP FUD mate
This is also old info - https://www.cardanohub.org/en/genesis-block-distribution/ :smiley:
Imho, from ~14 000 ICO holders to what ~180 000 holders atm? in 4-5 months is not that bad… but… sure we need more ppl to buy in :blush:
Ps. remember all ada sold on exchanges comes from those 14 000 pls - cos there is no ada that can be sold other then that
I know for a fact that the vibe in japan community is to hold ada for as long as they can - thats also good news… you think the competitors dont have “non-friendly whales”

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I can bet you didnt look close enough here - https://www.cardanohub.org/en/genesis-block-distribution/ its old info - and maybe you should have known this before investing? Look at the btc numbers invested… ppl whould have been whales even with keeping it in btc :blush:

I would say more - if address with lots of tx are owned by exchanges, and the rest by the whales - look how none of them sold their ada - or I am wrong? and the bad whales are dumping ? :roll_eyes:
you will always have a 1 % of 10% - but with time they all sell, we will sell, ALL will sell - cos this is how the market works

It’s not FUD, just a consequence of starting a project in this way. I know if I made some investment three years ago and the markets told me I was worth millions, I would want to realize some of that gain. Wouldn’t you? Those 180,000 have very small positions. Ironically the (somewhat racist) notion that “japanese hodl”, if true, will make it worse. The market cap will be 5% of the market churning, while the rest hodl forever. :slight_smile: Other cryptos have a similar distribution, just not as extreme.

I gave you specific numbers but you still keep on your ideas - good luck mate

How is that racist??? On the contrary I find it very positive and respectable, that’s why they are known to be a sophisticated country.

Regarding the power of whales I would think they have 2 methods of power within the system. one is the ability to manipulate price based on selling large numbers of shares and the other is through control of the voting and consequently treasury system. Not much can be done about the price manipulation part unless there is some provisions now or in the future about selling schedules. Regarding the voting shouldn’t we wait to see what kind of proposal is put forth regarding how that is to be handled? Perhaps a mechanism is being studied and considered that somehow mitigates the whale dilemma withing the liquid democracy framework? I would think that Charles and co would have considered this issue. Regardless thanks for bringing the topic up.

The numbers at that link agree with the original post. So you agree with the original poster then? Because it sounded before like you didn’t.

I do not think there will be price manipulation, you can see from the link the accounts are all “1 transaction”, i.e. hodl. But later when there is voting on projects (perhaps including who / what companies will do the work) obviously they will be deciding what happens. Does that bother people? Maybe that’s fair, these guys bought in early, it’s their ship… tbh the idea late comers can re-neg a contract is laughable and total bs.

Why do you think they would vote for something that could damage their own value? :nerd_face: Just the contrary - they will push for an aggresive agenda to pump the price :wink:

Your optimism is adorable. :slight_smile: Of course, I hope you’re right because I really want Cardano to be a viable alternative to fiat.

Of all the issues we must endure with cryptocurrencies (volatility, potential gov regulation, exchange lockups, exchange outages, exchange hacks, constant FUD, etc.), being forced to trust a bunch of anonymous whales is the worst because now we’re dealing with the same oligarchy problems that are destroying our fiat world economy. And now we have a constant looming presence over the entire ADA economy, with everybody chattering and whispering: “What will the whales think? What will they do? How will they vote? Will they like me and my project? How can we kiss their a$$ and beg them to hold onto their ADA to make sure they don’t manipulate/crash the market to hurt us? . . . .”

In fact, the whales will constantly vote against rational safeguards that might reduce their wealth/power/control over the ecosystem. This is just like the most powerful corporations do today with respect to rational industry regulations and labor policies, which they are always sabotaging, which is killing the middle class in many countries.

Yes, without a clear statement from CF, this is the best we can hope for.

It’s difficult to believe that Charles/team did not take this ADA/power concentration problem into account. This is such a basic governance risk; and after watching all the interviews with all the discussion about trust-less systems and decentralized treasury, etc., I assumed this risk was already mitigated with a much more even distribution of ADA during the voucher sale. I should have looked at the distribution sooner, but I was more focused on learning the technical components.

Anyway, maybe the CF team will eventually provide some clarity on these issues. If they don’t, they’re going to lose a lot of the energy in the community because a huge part of what makes Cardano special and exciting (and even fighting a revolution for) is the idea that it will deliver a truly decentralized governance system.

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