In November 2021, Bitcoin hit an all-time high of $69,000, prompting new investors to jump on the bandwagon and old investors to continue stacking sats, thus increasing its total number of addresses. According to data from Glassnode, one million Bitcoin addresses now hold 1 BTC ($26,800) or more, indicating a widespread adoption of the cryptocurrency.

The number of addresses with full BTC status hastened during the second half of February 2021, when the currency was correcting after its historic high. Dan Ashmore, Head of Research at the Investoo Group, stated that holding a full bitcoin is roughly equal to half the median US salary, meaning that, despite the price drop in Bitcoin, it may still be out of some investors' reach if prices return to their former heights. When it comes to the 1 million milestone, Ashmore believes that it speaks to the growing mainstream adoption of Bitcoin.

However, it must be remembered that one address may not represent one person, and, more importantly, the majority of Bitcoin is held by cryptocurrency exchanges, which constitute 10% of the total number of Bitcoins in circulation, with Binance, Coinbase, and Bitfinex leading the pack. Furthermore, nearly 1.5 million bitcoins are considered lost forever due to owners not being able to access their wallets. Despite distribution concentration, Erik Saberski, VP of Data Science at The Tie, posits that the more people that can afford to go "full bitcoiner" for 1 BTC or more the greater the likelihood of price stability.

The takeaway here is that widespread adoption of Bitcoin is rising. One million addresses hold 1 BTC or more and the potential for further adoption initiatives lies in the near future. That said, there is still a lot of Bitcoin that is inaccessible and that is concentrated with crypto exchanges. Despite such concentration, the greater the number of people that hold a full bitcoin, the more likely the scene is to see a slower pace of price fluctuations, marking a new level of maturity.



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