San Francisc-based cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase could soon hold over 1 million bitcoin on its cold wallets, showing bitcoiners are still storing funds on trading platforms en masse.
According to a report published by data source Longhash, Coinbase’s cold wallets contained roughly 970,000 BTC, worth about $8 million, at the beginning of this year. A graph shared with Longhash’s readers shows that the exchange’s bitcoin holdings have been growing steadily.
Source: Longhash
In comparison, the bitcoin holdings of other cryptocurrency exchanges’ bitcoin holdings haven’t grown exponentially last year, with no other trading platform having over 250,000 BTC in cold storage.
Coinbase is estimated to have over 30 million registered users, and if Longhash’s data is correct it’s also the cryptocurrency trading platform with the largest bitcoin holdings. It has managed to keep on gaining exposure over the years, even launching a trading app for its Coinbase Pro platform late last year.
While in September 2019 data from CryptoCompare’s Exchange Review showed that both Coinbase and Binance were seeing a massive surge in web traffic, the BTC holdings Binance had in cold storage remained relatively flat, while those of Coinbase kept surging.
Longhash points out that Coinbase has been serving institutional investors with its services, offering offering support for Maker contract voting and XTZ baking on its Coinbase Custody platform.
Coinbase’s apparent dominance and steady growth may be because it attracts a large share of long-term/institutional investors, who are less concerned with short term price swings.
Coinbase Custody, it’s worth noting, is estimated to have had $1 billion in assets under management 12 months after launching. As CryptoGlobe reported, Bitfinex recently moved $1.1 billion worth of bitcoin for an $80 fee, presumably while managing its cold storage wallets.
Featured image via Unsplash.
