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XRP is one of the largest digital assets in terms of total dollar value. With a market cap of over $19 billion, the native cryptocurrency for the Ripple Network is owned by many investors worldwide.
Despite the decline in its price over the years due to the SEC lawsuit and the crypto winter, many are still bullish on the coin. Out of the fixed supply of 100 billion coins, 50.26 billion are currently in circulation. Here, we discuss those who currently make up the XRP rich list, i.e., those holding the most XRP coins.
Who is on the XRP Rich List?
The addresses holding the most XRP coins generally belong to the project founders and executives, including Chris Larsen and Brad Garlinghouse, and centralized exchanges such as Binance, Kraken, KuCoin, Crypto.com, Bittrue, and others. These centralized exchanges and crypto lenders centralized exchanges and crypto lenders are the top XRP holders by percentage, holding XRP coins worth hundreds of millions in several addresses on behalf of their customers. Ripple and its founders also own a significant amount of XRP.
Most exchanges' XRP holdings are usually customers' deposits kept in reserves. This explains why Binance has one of the largest supplies of XRP coins. The exchange holds 77.49% of the XRP supply on exchanges, according to Coincarp. The top five addresses on Binance hold 162.9 million XRP, more than 58% of the overall supply on the exchanges.
Top XRP Holders by Percentage
Distribution of XRP’s circulating supply.
The top 10 addresses with the largest XRP supplies hold roughly 13,571,000,000 XRP, worth approximately $5.2 billion at current market rates. If we take into account the next 20 largest addresses, the top 30 XRP addresses control 19,800,000,000 XRP, or 39.3% of the entire circulating supply.
If you want to check the top addresses that are XRP whales yourself, we’ve prepared a list of the ten largest XRP addresses, with direct links to XRP Scan:
| Owner | Number of XRP | % of Circ. Supply | Blockchain address |
|---|---|---|---|
| Upbit | 4,103,350,319 | 8.16% | rEahGW5VLYQH2vGBfFmbv9BBpWSTDoukGR |
| Ripple #1 | 1,960,027,012 | 3.90% | rGSxFjoqmWz54PycrgQBQ5dB6e7TUpMxzq |
| Ripple #2 | 1,783,635,065 | 3.55% | rKveEyR1SrkWbJX214xcfH43ZsoGMb3PEv |
| Binance | 1,477,168,712 | 2.93% | rEy8TFcrAPvhpKrwyrscNYyqBGUkE9hKaJ |
| Bitstamp | 949,596,747 | 1.89% | rsX8cp4aj9grKVD9V1K2ouUBXgYsjgUtBL |
| Kraken | 770,000,042 | 1.53% | rUeDDFNp2q7Ymvyv75hFGC8DAcygVyJbNF |
| Coincheck | 660,979,773 | 1.31% | rwgvfze315jjAAxT2TyyDqAPzL68HpAp6v |
| Poloniex | 659,598,153 | 1.31% | rw7m3CtVHwGSdhFjV4MyJozmZJv3DYQnsA |
| Unknown | 607,476,428 | 1.21% | rEvwSpejhGTbdAXbxRTpGAzPBQkBRZxN5s |
| Bithumb | 600,000,112 | 1.19% | rZcBQae9iSJqFYBpNCfxGLXH7xuEzizxR |
*Data collected on December 7, 2022
As we can see from the table above, the South Korean exchange Upbit has the single highest amount of XRP in a single wallet, with over 4 billion XRP coins in one address. The second and third largest addresses belong to Ripple. For easier visualization of the distribution of the circulating supply, and how much XRP is in the hands of the top 10 wales, take a look at the XRP rich list graph for 2022.
The top 10 largest addresses control over 13.5 billion XRP.
Ripple founders and their XRP holdings
At the time of founding the project, the founders Chris Larsen, Jed McCaleb, and Arthur Brito allocated 20 billion XRP to themselves. Over the years, they have sold part of their holdings. Jed left the company in 2014, taking 9 billion XRP coins. He has been selling since then and recently sold off all his holdings. It took him eight years to finish selling off his XRP holdings.
However, the other co-founders are still holding most of their XRP. This is partly because of the SEC case against the company and its founders, in which the regulator considers XRP to be a security. Until the case is resolved in favor of Ripple, there is a risk that selling XRP could amount to selling unregistered securities in the US. This is why the cryptocurrency exchanges registered in the US have also delisted the coin.
According to Forbes, the co-founder and former CEO Chris Larsen is one of the largest holders with over 5 billion XRP. At least five addresses, containing 2.5 billion XRP in total, are directly traceable to him. The current CEO, Brad Garlinghouse, is also one of the largest holders, although there are no specifics on how many XRP coins he holds.
How XRP compares to BTC, ETH, and other popular cryptos?
| Crypto Asset | % of Circ. Supply Held by Top 10 Add. |
|---|---|
| XRP | 26.8% |
| Bitcoin | 6.2% |
| Ethereum | 24.1% |
| Dogecoin | 49.1% |
| Solana | 9.2% |
| Cardano | 6.4% |
*Data collected on December 7, 2022
XRP has a fixed supply of 100 billion and is designed to be deflationary. So far, over 50 billion coins have been issued, with retail investors controlling most of the supply. This is evident in how most of the supply is now on exchanges. There are 16 addresses with at least 500 million XRP, and all these addresses hold more than 16 billion of all XRP in circulation. This represents 32% of the circulating supply.
Bitcoin Whales
For Bitcoin, only five addresses have over 100,000 BTC, and these addresses control 796,437 BTC. One hundred nine addresses have between 10,000 and 100,000 BTC total of almost 2.3 million BTC, while 1,964 addresses have between 1,000 and 10,000 BTC total of 4.6 million BTC. Overall, these addresses control about 7.7 million of BTC supply. That is over 40% of the circulating supply.
Ethereum Whales
Almost 2 million Ethereum addresses are holding the 120.5 million Ether in circulation, according to Etherscan. 12.8% of that supply is locked in the Ethereum staking control, while 3%, which is 3.7 million, is the Wrapped Ether contract. Several exchanges, such as Binance, Gemini, Kraken, OKX, Bitfinex, Crypto.com, Compound, etc.
Layer 2 networks such as Abitrum and Polygon also hold significant ETH on their bridge contracts. Overall, 132 addresses hold at least 100,000 ETH, mostly institutional addresses. The top 100 addresses on Ethereum hold about 40% of the supply. There are over 1200 addresses that hold at least 10,000 ETH, and these wallets account for more than 70% of the total supply.
Dogecoin Whales
Dogecoin has a total supply of 132 billion, and 121 addresses have between 100 million and 100 billion DOGE. These addresses hold over 97 billion DOGE, 73% of the circulating supply, according to Dogecoin Explorer. However, most addresses with this large holding belong to exchanges such as Robinhood, Binance, Kraken, Crypto.com, etc. Individuals also own some, although their identity is unknown.
Solana SOL Whales
Meanwhile, the top 100 SOL holders have 34.05% of the overall supply of 363.7 million, with the 100th address holding 685,367 SOL. Per Coincarp, the top ten wallets hold 9.21% of the assets, with the number one wallet holding 7.762 million coins.
Cardano ADA Whales
Unlike most other coins, ADA whales don't control a sizable portion of the circulating supply. The coin has a circulating supply of 35 billion, and the top 10 holders only control 6.41%, according to Cardano Explorer data. The top 100 wallets with the most ADA hold 18.97% of the circulating supply, which leads to a much less top-heavy rich list than XRP.
Final Thoughts
XRP whales mostly comprise exchanges and crypto firms with billions of XRP in multiple addresses for their client. The top 16 addresses alone control 32% of the circulating supply. But most of these belong to exchanges, meaning they are for retail investors. The most notable public address among the top 16 addresses are those belonging to Chris Larsen and contain 2.5 billion XRP coins.