Cryptocurrency inequality and market manipulation

The current status-quo of cryptocurrency is a misnomer of what it is flaunted to be. It is touted as decentralized, sans middle men. But the stubborn reality is that for their transactions cryptocurrency is overwhelmingly relying on the centralized exchanges, which manipulate token price and make a killing at the expense of new investor funds.

Cryptocurrency is also extremely unequal in wealth distribution. 1,000 wallets own 40 Percent of the Bitcoin Market. As in any asset class, large individual holders and large institutional holders can and do collude to manipulate price. In cryptocurrencies, the propensity for market manipulation by large holders is extremely high given the absence of regulatory mechanism and the speculative nature of these assets.

Cryptocurrency inequality is far worse in other tokens, where ICO founders and venture capitals own the preponderance of tokens, using small holders owning a few tokens as a cannon fodder for pump and dump. Interestingly of all large cap coins and tokens, bitcoin has the least concentration of asset holdings. The top 100 bitcoin addresses control 17.3 percent of all the issued currency, according to crypto hedge fund Tetras Capital. With ether, a rival to bitcoin, the top 100 addresses control 40 percent of the supply, and with coins such as Gnosis, Qtum, and Storj, TRX, top holders control more than 90 percent. Many large owners are part of the teams running these projects. Such large holdings are recipe for calculated pump and dump. Majority of altcoins have a history of that. Of all, TRX would probably win the cup.