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I'm not sure about this, but does every person using an exchange get their own address? My impression was that they don't and that a lot of transactions are ac
by leto_ii 6y ago
I'm not sure about this, but does every person using an exchange get their own address?
My impression was that they don't and that a lot of transactions are actually settled within the exchange using good ol' relational databases and not the blockchain.
If that's the case, then all of these people will get lumped into just a few exchange controlled adresses, which will give an exaggerated impression of concentration.
- KirillPanov 6y ago> I'm not sure about this, but does every person using an exchange get their own address? Definitely not. Exchanges that aren't stupid keep the vast majority of their funds in cold storage, which is held in a small number of addresses. Most people store their bitcoin on exchanges, even though that's a pretty bad idea. Not your keys not your coins. The article is massively misleading. It should say "95% of bitcoin is controlled by a small number of entities, most of which are exchanges". That's still not good, but at least it's not deceptive.
- leto_ii 6y ago> The article is massively misleading. It should say "95% of bitcoin is controlled by a small number of entities, most of which are exchanges". Yeah, that's exactly what I felt as well. Thanks for clarifying.
- aasasd 6y ago> Exchanges that aren't stupid keep the vast majority of their funds in cold storage That sounds dumb on their part, as that money isn't doing work that it could. Perhaps they should invest it in the meanwhile. But since it's users' money, maybe set up a provision that only a part of the funds is invested, and the rest stay put, to give them back to the users on demand. Most people don't regularly take out all their coins at once, so the exchange won't need to have them all on hand, most of the time.