Top 10 Richest People in Blockchain Globally, Four of Whom Have Lost Their Fortunes
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Top 10 Richest People in Blockchain Globally, Four of Whom Have Lost Their Fortunes
Starting from Satoshi Nakamoto's enormous wealth, list the holders from billions to millions of dollars.
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsAuthor: Finn Grant
Translation: TechFlow
From Bitcoin's founder Satoshi Nakamoto to unfortunate crypto holders like Rain Lohmus and James Howells, here is a list of the world's top ten wealthiest individuals on-chain.
Satoshi Nakamoto is the richest cryptocurrency holder globally, with an on-chain net worth of $115 billion (valued at the time of writing). This immense wealth comes entirely from Bitcoins he mined between 2009 and 2010, distributed across 22,000 addresses.
According to the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index, Satoshi Nakamoto ranks among the world’s top 20 wealthiest individuals.
The 22,000 Bitcoin wallets belonging to Satoshi Nakamoto are among the most watched assets in the industry—any movement from these wallets could send shockwaves through the entire cryptocurrency market.
Below is a list of the world's wealthiest on-chain individuals compiled from Arkham data, starting with Satoshi Nakamoto’s massive fortune and continuing down to those holding hundreds of millions or tens of millions of dollars.
1. Satoshi Nakamoto — $115 billion
As previously mentioned, Satoshi Nakamoto's wealth far exceeds $100 billion. However, there may be debate about whether he should be included on this list, as it remains unknown whether Satoshi Nakamoto is a single individual or a collective team.
2. Justin Sun — $1.9 billion
Justin Sun is a Chinese entrepreneur and a pioneer in the cryptocurrency space. He is best known for founding the TRON blockchain platform, which focuses on decentralized applications and digital content sharing. He also serves as CEO of BitTorrent and owns two cryptocurrency exchanges.
According to Arkham data, Justin Sun’s on-chain wealth is approximately $1.9 billion. However, Arkham estimates his total net worth between $5 billion and $6 billion. To read our full research report on Justin Sun’s net worth estimate for 2025, click here.
Justin Sun holds a diverse portfolio of cryptocurrency assets.
Recently, Sun became the center of controversy involving World Liberty Financial (WLFI), a crypto project backed by Donald Trump. After acquiring a significant stake in WLFI, Sun’s WLFI wallet was blacklisted by the project team when it transferred around $9 million worth of WLFI tokens to exchanges.
3. Rain Lohmus — $886 million
Rain Lohmus is one of the most famous cautionary tales in the cryptocurrency world. The Estonian banker and co-founder of LHV Bank was an early supporter of Ethereum and participated in its 2014 initial coin offering (ICO). He invested about $75,000 at the time and received an astonishing 250,000 ETH.
However, Lohmus later lost the private keys to the wallet storing these assets. Although these assets remain visible and verifiable on the blockchain, he cannot access or transfer them. His multi-billion-dollar fortune is now locked away—a stark reminder of the importance of key management and the unique risks of self-custody in the digital asset world.
Currently, Lohmus’s ETH holdings are valued at $854 million.
4. Vitalik Buterin — $867 million
Second only to Satoshi Nakamoto on this list, Vitalik Buterin is likely one of the most well-known figures. The visionary programmer is a co-founder of Ethereum and received an allocation of ETH during the project’s early stages.
Buterin’s on-chain wealth primarily stems from his large holdings of ETH, whose value has significantly increased since the launch of the Ethereum network in 2015. He is also known for receiving massive amounts of tokens from meme coin projects (such as Shiba Inu) sent to his public address—an unsolicited attempt by such projects to gain legitimacy, which Buterin did not request.
5. James Howells — $838 million
Like Rain Lohmus, James Howells is another cautionary tale in the crypto space. The Welsh IT worker was one of the earliest Bitcoin miners in 2010, mining approximately 8,000 BTC using his personal laptop.
However, during a cleanup in 2013, he accidentally threw away the hard drive containing the private keys to these Bitcoins. Today, that hard drive lies buried under thousands of tons of waste in a local landfill. Despite multiple attempts to convince Newport City Council to allow him to excavate the site—and offering to share part of the recovered wealth—his requests have consistently been denied.
Through Arkham data, Howells’ immense wealth is visible to anyone—but for him, it remains irretrievable.
6. Stefan Thomas — $734 million
Stefan Thomas, a German-born programmer and early Bitcoin developer, also has his vast on-chain fortune locked away. In 2011, he was rewarded with 7,002 BTC for creating an animated video explaining how Bitcoin works.
To secure the private keys, he stored them on a highly secure IronKey hardware wallet, which encrypts its contents. Unfortunately, Thomas lost the piece of paper where he wrote down the password. The IronKey device allows users ten password attempts before permanently erasing the data. Thomas has already tried eight times, leaving only two attempts remaining to recall the correct password and unlock over $700 million in wealth.
7. Clifton Collins — $629 million
Clifton Collins, an Irish drug trafficker, used proceeds from marijuana sales between 2011 and 2012 to purchase 6,000 BTC when Bitcoin was priced around $5 each.
Collins’ story is another example of lost crypto wealth. He stored the Bitcoin private keys on a piece of paper hidden inside a fishing rod. After his arrest, the fishing rod went missing. Although the Irish government officially seized the asset, due to the loss of the private key, this massive fortune remains permanently locked across multiple independent wallets and is unrecoverable.
8. Owen Gunden — $561 million
Owen Gunden is an early Bitcoin arbitrage trader who operated on exchanges such as Mt. Gox and Tradehill. During Mt. Gox’s operation, he traded tens of thousands of BTC and accumulated substantial assets in the early days of Bitcoin.
Later, Gunden shifted from trading to investing and executive roles. He served on the board of LedgerX, the first federally regulated U.S. platform for physically settled cryptocurrency swaps and options.
Although he hasn’t been active on X (formerly Twitter) since 2018, his crypto wallets remain operational. He previously used services like BlockFi and Genesis Trading, both of which later went bankrupt. As a creditor in the Genesis bankruptcy distribution, he received over 600 BTC.
Gunden previously ranked third on this list, but in recent days he began transferring Bitcoin to Kraken addresses, likely for selling purposes. Within the past week, he has moved 1,800 BTC (worth approximately $200 million) to Kraken. While he may still hold these Bitcoins, due to asset movements, his ranking on the on-chain crypto wealth list has dropped to eighth place.
9. DiscusFish — $275 million
DiscusFish, real name Shi Hang Mao, is co-founder and CEO of Cobo.com, a well-known cryptocurrency wallet and custody solutions provider. He is also the founder of F2Pool, China’s first Bitcoin mining pool. DiscusFish’s on-chain wealth primarily results from his pivotal role in building critical crypto infrastructure and his long-standing status as a major investor and whale in the cryptocurrency space.
DiscusFish holds a diversified portfolio across multiple cryptocurrencies, including:
10. Patricio Worthalter — $226 million
Patricio Worthalter is an Argentine entrepreneur and founder of POAP (Proof of Attendance Protocol), a widely used protocol within the Ethereum ecosystem that enables event organizers to distribute cryptographic badges (NFTs) to participants, creating verifiable records of life experiences.
As the founder of a successful and deeply integrated Web3 infrastructure project, Worthalter’s on-chain wealth stems from his project’s success and his early and ongoing involvement in the crypto space.
Worthalter’s holdings span various cryptocurrencies, primarily including:
Past Top 10 Crypto Millionaires:
James Fickel — $203 million
James Fickel is a well-known cryptocurrency investor and trader. His crypto journey began in 2016 when he invested $400,000 to buy Ethereum (ETH) at around $0.80 per coin.
At the time of writing, Fickel still holds over 57,000 ETH, valued at approximately $203 million.
Last year, Fickel lost $43 million betting on ETH’s price performance against BTC, an event that drew widespread attention. Nonetheless, he remains one of the major Ethereum whales and one of the wealthiest individual cryptocurrency holders in the world.
Currently, Fickel focuses primarily on The Amaranth Foundation, a neuroscience and longevity foundation he founded.
Stefan George — $106 million
Stefan George is co-founder and CTO of Gnosis, an Ethereum-based ecosystem focused on developing infrastructure for decentralized finance (DeFi) and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). Gnosis is best known for its prediction market platform and its flagship product, Gnosis Safe (now called “Safe”), a multi-signature smart contract wallet that has become the industry standard for securing treasury assets among DAOs and crypto companies.
George’s on-chain wealth largely originates from his founding role at Gnosis, including ownership of the project’s native token GNO and other assets accumulated throughout its development.
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