What coins have whales like a16z, Alameda, and Vitalik bought?

The domestic stock market has the "Dragon and Tiger List" revealing the trading volume rankings of popular stocks by brokerage firms. The three major commodity futures exchanges publish cumulative positions and daily trading volume information based on futures companies after the market closes. It can be said that, compared to cryptocurrency trading platforms, mature markets have a more robust information disclosure mechanism.

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/3195f3cec921c4516304e7e4de75c3a324876c7b.png)
> Data from the Dalian Commodity Exchange iron ore 2101 contract on December 4

At the same time, centralized trading platforms have been criticized by some users for dark operations and "data pinning" behaviors. In the world of DeFi, everything is on-chain, in other words, the on-chain world is completely transparent. As shown in "Hunting: What Whales Did Amid the DeFi Token Crash," if we compare the on-chain world to the ocean, the activities of large "whales" with massive amounts of capital will certainly trigger ripples in the "chain sea." Often, the agile "whale hunters" only need to observe the tide by the sea, surveying on-chain information to assist their decision-making.

This article will focus on analyzing some known Ethereum addresses used by institutions and well-known "whales," and introduce relevant tools to help everyone clarify the world beneath the surface in the ocean of DeFi with a "keen eye."

Rhythm Note: The following content comes from Twitter user Nick Chong and community speculation, and does not constitute investment advice.

### 1. Institutional Addresses and Holdings

#### a16z

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/fba839f55e20a0e4c9e86db7cff61049bd686a9d.png)
> Related address: 0x05e793ce0c6027323ac150f6d45c2344d28b6019

One of the wallets of top investment firm a16z, this wallet address has also been marked as a16z on Etherscan. Currently, the address holds 50,000 MakerDAO tokens (MKR), valued at approximately $28.5 million, 370,000 Synthetix tokens (SNX), valued at approximately $1.9 million, and 97,000 Augur tokens (REPv2), valued at approximately $1.6 million.

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/89141fe866ec2ffb1e5ce6e64d6d804fbb02ba69.png)
> On-chain transfers

From the on-chain transfers, it can be seen that a16z rarely trades, with the most recent token transfer dating back 100 days. Rhythm has found that this address of a16z is also the one with the least on-chain transactions in this article.

#### Polychain

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/67893e9ef30cb28f04d23cd04d8abe7502428e01.png)
> Related address: 0xBcd5000F5c522856E710c5d274bb672B2f2EefBf

Polychain has recently been praised for its continuous purchases of yearn.finance (YFI). This address received 329 YFI transferred from Binance on October 17, when the price was $14,000; the last portion was transferred to this address on November 9, with 140 YFI at a price of $15,000 (transfer does not equal purchase price). The purchasing activities of this address have attracted significant attention from many Twitter users. Additionally, Polychain's address holds 48,000 Ethereum, valued at approximately $28 million.

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/69dd598c25fabd02ab80a8972c98035c212a5265.png)
> Recently, Polychain transferred part of the 1,300 MakerDAO tokens (MKR) held by this address to a trading platform.

#### Jump Trading

Jump has been operating since 1999 and is a top global market-making and high-frequency trading firm. The company is also known for its high level of confidentiality, with little information about its business available on its website. It is active in the crypto market, providing liquidity to trading platforms, and provided liquidity for Robinhood's crypto division in 2018. Its sister company, Jump Capital, is an active investor in the crypto market, having previously supported companies such as BitGo, Bitnomial, Bitso, and Curve.

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/ef9e51aca3b2f99c349ee1498dbaf7c8e586267d.png)
> Related address: 0xf584f8728b874a6a5c7a8d4d387c9aae9172d621

Jump's Ethereum address currently holds Serum tokens valued at approximately $40 million, which may be related to its investment in Serum. Rhythm has also found that Jump holds 26,000 Ethereum, valued at $15 million, and tokens from Keep Network and Compound valued at approximately $20 million.

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/b1c5643c9b78f19ec1fde89f44f849859027c77c.png)
> It can be seen that Jump's on-chain activities are quite frequent, with the most recent on-chain transfer being a transfer of $56,000 to Binance.

### 2. Notable Users

#### Vitalik Buterin

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/405f0ec1df5417a550cd40c492041e808ef5c32a.png)
> Related address: 0x1db3439a222c519ab44bb1144fc28167b4fa6ee6

This is Vitalik's address, officially marked as Vb2 on Etherscan, and it is the address where Vitalik sends Ethereum tokens to the Ethereum 2.0 staking contract. Currently, this address holds 1,000 Ethereum, as well as Augur tokens (REP) and Maker tokens (MKR), both of which are important members of the Ethereum ecosystem that Vitalik appreciates and often discusses. Notably, Rhythm has observed that Vitalik also holds a large amount of the U.S. election prediction token nTrump from Augur. When the delivery conditions are triggered, for example, if Trump fails to be re-elected, the nTrump token price will settle at $1, while the yTrump token price will be $0.

#### Alameda Research (SBF)

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/d0422f252aa527687dbe73dea24602841049bf22.png)
> Related address: 0x477573f212a7bdd5f7c12889bd1ad0aa44fb82aa

This address belongs to Alameda Research and is also the address mentioned in the reference reading that previously staked a large amount of FTT to swap for YFI. According to Etherscan, this address currently holds about 156 Ethereum and Serum tokens (SRM) valued at $350,000. However, this is far from the full picture of this address; in fact, it is a wallet address worth nearly $100 million, but due to the limitations of Etherscan (which does not display the value of LP tokens and Staking tokens), it only shows the value of substantive tokens. Further analysis and display of other assets of this address will be provided later.

#### Huang Licheng

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/f270104f0da9795205fc0ac43178bbe94c6aa554.png)
> Related address: 0x020ca66c30bec2c4fe3861a94e4db4a498a35872

According to speculation from Twitter users, this address belongs to Huang Licheng, the founder of Mithril, Cream.Finance, and SWAG.Finance. This address holds a large amount of Cream tokens (currently valued at about $10 million) and has staked them on the Cream.Finance platform. Similar to the previous situation, the market value of this portion of tokens will not be displayed on Etherscan.

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/7b9b9a8ee52f768ab0e82aca00ecce85f1d75a69.png)
> This address is also one of the earliest users to purchase KP3R.

Just as having ingredients without culinary skills is insufficient to cook a delicious dish. Simply observing the addresses that need to be monitored is far from enough; manually refreshing addresses over a long period is an extremely inefficient method. At this point, on-chain analysis tools need to be introduced. Below are some tools that simplify/quantify addresses and data.

### 3. Related Tools

#### DeBank

The decentralized finance portal DeBank not only provides total locked value (TVL) data for various projects but also offers an important wallet tracking feature. Users can connect to DeBank through wallet addresses to view account assets, or input other addresses they want to track. DeBank provides batch registration for different addresses; in short, users can track DeFi assets across multiple accounts. Similar products include Zapper and Zerion. The image below shows the Alameda address, which only displays assets of over $400,000 on Etherscan, but by using DeBank and other DeFi management software, one can see its "true face," and this situation also applies to the address holding a large amount of Cream tokens mentioned above.

![](https://image.theblockbeats.com/upload/2020-12-07/121f6bf1562b5e1db46729204cb3c587ddd3a306.png)

#### Telegram Bots

Users familiar with Telegram can try using channels like UniWhales.io to observe large on-chain transactions on Uniswap or use TrackTX to monitor on-chain activities of specific addresses or contracts.

### 4. Conclusion

Not only by observing addresses and their behaviors, users can also summarize the "values" of different wallets. The addresses above exhibit distinct investment styles of various institutions/individuals, with some addresses having significant analyzability or practicality. Researching addresses or project contracts in the DeFi era will yield many interesting conclusions; for example, by studying the holding addresses and concentration of WBTC, users can gain a deeper understanding of the current development of DeFi.

There are two methods to observe data. The first is to query and track familiar addresses to learn about new projects and ideas; the second is to study specific coin addresses to assist in decision-making. This article aims to spark ideas, and more meaningful tools and methods for observing on-chain data await users to explore and discover.

Compared to the market overview attributes of Dune Analytics, this article intends to provide a more nuanced path to observe the market. The cryptocurrency market is a highly reflexive capital market, and users need to make rational judgments on their own. At the same time, the addresses mentioned in this article are highly likely to only represent part of the institutions' addresses, and users should not take them as investment guidance.