The number of retail bitcoin investors has increased by 11% over the past year

According to analyst firm Glassnode, forOver the past 12 months, the number of bitcoin addresses that hold from 1 to 10 coins has increased by almost 11%, which indicates an increase in interest from retail investors.

According to the study, as of January 14this year, there were 784 thousand addresses with one or more bitcoins, and exactly a year ago their number was 707 thousand. Such accumulation is typical for retail buyers, and over the previous years it was at approximately the same level, even despiteprice fluctuations.

Analysts also noted a 10 percent increase in wallets with a balance of 0.1 to 1 MTC for the same period.

However, whales are still dominating the market,and their power is growing, because addresses with a supply of at least 1000 coins now account for 42.1% of the total number of coins mined, although during the cryptocurrency period of 2017 this figure was 37.9%.

According to experts, such a dynamicindicates an increase in interest in the first cryptocurrency among retail investors. Although increasing the number of addresses does not necessarily mean a similar influx of owners, as each user can have many wallets.

However, the growing popularity of the HODL strategyAmong crypto investors, other studies confirm this. For example, according to the fintech company Digital Assets Data, almost 10.7 million bitcoins (60% of their total) have not left their addresses for more than a year.

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