<p>All Bitcoin transactions are public, in the sense that everyone can see which addresses sent and received the coins. (However, this includes no information about who owns the addresses.) This is an essential part of the Bitcoin protocol: you can verify the validity of a transaction that sends coins to you, by tracing the "chain of custody" of those coins all the way back to their creation,   and checking cryptographically that each transaction along the way was properly authorized.</p>

<p>So since transaction data is public, everyone can see the balance of every address. Thus it's possible to determine that 927 addresses own over half of all coins in existence. This doesn't tell us who the human owners are! It's quite likely that some of those addresses belong to the same people, meaning that wealth is actually concentrated in even fewer hands. On the other hand, it's also possible that some of those addresses are shared property; for instance, some could belong to a mutual fund.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-13T15:16:04.387Z
Thanks Nate. Is there anyway we can technically do this? Where can we see the public transactions?
AGamePlayer
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-13T15:26:23.353Z
@aw qirui:There are several "block explorer" sites such as http://blockchain.info where  you can browse transactions, addresses, etc. I'm not sure if they specifically can show you the richest addresses; that might require custom software to analyze the transaction data (of which a copy is stored on most Bitcoin client computers).
Nate Eldredge
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-13T15:13:02.950Z
2014-02-13T15:28:24.300Z
2014-02-13T15:28:24.300Z
Nate Eldredge
<p>I read this post on this site:
<a href="https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/17582/who-are-creating-all-the-alternate-cryptocurrencies">Who are creating all the alternate cryptocurrencies?</a></p>

<p>In it, there is a answer saying:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>An article about a month ago was written about the owners of Bitcoin
  and we know that 47 people owned about 1/4 of the Bitcoins and 927
  owned over 50%.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>I am quite curious, how do the people know who owns how much? What if the owners are lying?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-02-14T12:39:32.227Z
related: [Is it possible to estimate the Gini coefficient for Bitcoins and if the trend is increasing or decreasing?](http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/86/5406), [Is there a reliable way to measure bitcoin wealth distribution?](http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/3461/5406), [In the end, will there only be one?](http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/14190/5406)
Murch
CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-09-13T18:24:52.247Z
FYI you can see the 100 "richest" addresses here: https://99bitcoins.com/bitcoin-rich-list-top100/
weston
<economic-theory><wealth-distribution>
How do people know that less than 1000 people own 50% of all bitcoins?
AGamePlayer
# How do people know that less than 1000 people own 50% of all bitcoins?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2014-02-13)

I read this post on this site:
[Who are creating all the alternate cryptocurrencies?](https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/17582/who-are-creating-all-the-alternate-cryptocurrencies)

In it, there is a answer saying:

> An article about a month ago was written about the owners of Bitcoin
> and we know that 47 people owned about 1/4 of the Bitcoins and 927
> owned over 50%.

I am quite curious, how do the people know who owns how much? What if the owners are lying?

**Tags:** economic-theory, wealth-distribution

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: related: [Is it possible to estimate the Gini coefficient for Bitcoins and if the trend is increasing or decreasing?](http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/86/5406), [Is there a reliable way to measure bitcoin wealth distribution?](http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/3461/5406), [In the end, will there only be one?](http://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/q/14190/5406)  
> **username_2**: FYI you can see the 100 "richest" addresses here: https://99bitcoins.com/bitcoin-rich-list-top100/  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_3 on 2014-02-13. Score: 2

All Bitcoin transactions are public, in the sense that everyone can see which addresses sent and received the coins. (However, this includes no information about who owns the addresses.) This is an essential part of the Bitcoin protocol: you can verify the validity of a transaction that sends coins to you, by tracing the "chain of custody" of those coins all the way back to their creation, and checking cryptographically that each transaction along the way was properly authorized.

So since transaction data is public, everyone can see the balance of every address. Thus it's possible to determine that 927 addresses own over half of all coins in existence. This doesn't tell us who the human owners are! It's quite likely that some of those addresses belong to the same people, meaning that wealth is actually concentrated in even fewer hands. On the other hand, it's also possible that some of those addresses are shared property; for instance, some could belong to a mutual fund.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Thanks username_3. Is there anyway we can technically do this? Where can we see the public transactions?  
> **username_3**: @aw qirui:There are several "block explorer" sites such as http://blockchain.info where  you can browse transactions, addresses, etc. I'm not sure if they specifically can show you the richest addresses; that might require custom software to analyze the transaction data (of which a copy is stored on most Bitcoin client computers).  

---

