A new on-chain analysis reveals a dramatic shift in the composition of wealth on the Ethereum network, with 58% of capital held by its largest addresses existing outside of Ethereum (ETH) itself, residing in ERC-20 tokens and stablecoins. This finding fundamentally alters the understanding of power and risk distribution on the blockchain.
When ranking the top 10,000 Ethereum addresses by ETH balance alone, their combined holdings total $189 billion. However, when these same addresses are ranked by their total assets—including ETH, ERC-20 tokens, and stablecoins—the figure soars to $426 billion, more than double the conventional measure.
The analysis shows a major change in the identity of key holders. Of the top 1,000 addresses, only 537 appear in both the ETH-only and aggregated rankings, meaning nearly half of Ethereum's largest holders are invisible in traditional ETH-balance views. ETH now represents just 42% of these top addresses' holdings, with stablecoins accounting for roughly 26% and other ERC-20 tokens making up the remainder.
Smart contracts have emerged as dominant players, controlling nearly 40% of the capital among top holders in the aggregated view—roughly three times their share when viewed through an ETH-only lens. This signifies a migration of risk from individual decision-makers to automated mechanisms governed by code and token economics.
The report introduces a new metric, the Printing-Press Index (PPI), to measure how much of a protocol's token holdings consist of its own self-issued tokens. It finds that among many DeFi protocols, this figure clusters around 50%, with names like Uniswap, Aave, and Mantle cited as examples. The analysis identifies 20% as the point where self-issued tokens introduce meaningful risk and 40-50% as a threshold for entering "fragile territory." At these levels, a balance sheet is partially backed by confidence in itself rather than external capital, creating vulnerability to a reflexive unwind similar to the LUNA-UST collapse if selling pressure emerges.
In a related but separate development underscoring institutional activity, blockchain analytics platform The Data Nerd reported that an address linked to crypto hedge fund Arrington Capital withdrew exactly 20,000 ETH (worth approximately $38.28 million) from exchanges Binance and Deribit. This coordinated move to private cold storage is interpreted by market analysts as a signal of strategic, long-term accumulation. The round-number, multi-exchange execution pattern is characteristic of planned institutional allocation. This withdrawal occurs amid broader trends of declining exchange reserves, with centralized exchange ETH balances down 28% since January 2024.
