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Ethereum addresses have an edge over Bitcoin, but there could be a hidden snag

Photo of: Sangeetha Golchha
by Sangeetha Golchha

Bitcoin experienced a major bullish trend when it saw its price increase by 7%, and compared to it, Ethereum’s price hasn’t performed exceptionally to compete against what Bitcoin has achieved in a week. But Ethereum’s on-chain numbers were much better in the last week as compared to Bitcoin. 

In a recent report by Coinmetrics, it suggested that Bitcoin’s active addresses are descending down the spiral registering a decline of 2.7% while there was a notable decrease by 3.1%. But its closest competitor Ethereum experienced a 27% increase week-over-week in its active addresses registering more than 600k addresses for at least 3 consecutive days. This was a trend that was noticed for the first time ever since in January 2018. 

Source: CoinMetrics

The above two charts have been presented by Coinmetrics and it represents the number of Bitcoin and Ethereum addresses which hold at least $1 in the first chart and between $1 – $10 in the next chart. As we can clearly see, the number of addresses holding at least $1 in its address is led by Bitcoin with 24 million addresses holding the same. Ethereum was lagging behind only marginally with around 21.2 million addresses. 

However, when you go to the next chart, we see the reversal of trends. In the category of addresses holding between $1 – $10, Ethereum was way ahead of Bitcoin. The report said:

“There are about 16.45M BTC addresses holding at least $10 vs about 6.51M for ETH. This means there are close to 15M ETH addresses holding between $1 and $10 compared to about 7.55M for BTC.”

The two charts are clear enough to make us understand that in the category of on-chain data Ethereum is leading in terms of macro-level adoption although there is still some kind of clarification required for the asset which is held by these addresses. Now it is also true that the Ethereum addresses did show growth of stablecoin supply. Taking this forward it was observed that the Stablecoin active addresses hit a new all-time high during October 15th with Ethereum addresses holding USDT, USDC leading among all. 

Taking the analysis to a deeper level, Bitcoin addresses only hold BTC while Ethereum is an interoperable network allowing the users to hold stablecoins also. This could have been one of the likely conditions that caused the major pump in the number of addresses holding between $1 – $10. But, the trouble starts when it is known that Ethereum addresses holding USDT and USDC are under scrutiny off late because the Centre has blacklisted about 100,000 USDC stored in Ethereum addresses. 

Owing to these factors Ethereum’s address superiority makes its a vain attempt because of how it is susceptible to the illegal storage of value reducing its chances of adoption. And on those grounds when we compare it to Bitcoin, the Bitcoin addresses appear more safe and credible because there is a lot of transparency involved.