IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/fip/fedpwp/98653.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Beneath the Crypto Currents: The Hidden Effect of Crypto “Whales”

Author

Abstract

Cryptocurrency markets are often characterized by market manipulation or, at the very least, by a sharp distinction between large and sophisticated investors and small retail investors. While traditional assets often see a divergence in the success of institutional traders and retail traders, we find an even more pronounced difference regarding the holders of Ethereum (ETH), the second-largest cryptocurrency by volume. We see a significant difference in how large holders of ETH behave compared with smaller holders of ETH relative to price movements and the volatility of the cryptocurrency. We find that large ETH holders tend to increase their ETH holdings prior to a price increase, while small ETH holders tend to reduce their ETH holdings prior to a price increase. In other words, ETH returns tend to move in the direction that benefits crypto “whales” while reducing returns (or increasing loss) to “minnows.” Additionally, we find that the volatility of ETH returns seems to be driven by small retail investors rather than by the crypto whales.

Suggested Citation

  • Alan Chernoff & Julapa Jagtiani, 2024. "Beneath the Crypto Currents: The Hidden Effect of Crypto “Whales”," Working Papers 24-14, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
  • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedpwp:98653
    DOI: 10.21799/frbp.wp.2024.14
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.philadelphiafed.org/-/media/frbp/assets/working-papers/2024/wp24-14.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.21799/frbp.wp.2024.14?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bouri, Elie & Lau, Chi Keung Marco & Lucey, Brian & Roubaud, David, 2019. "Trading volume and the predictability of return and volatility in the cryptocurrency market," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 340-346.
    2. Al-Yahyaee, Khamis Hamed & Mensi, Walid & Ko, Hee-Un & Yoon, Seong-Min & Kang, Sang Hoon, 2020. "Why cryptocurrency markets are inefficient: The impact of liquidity and volatility," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 52(C).
    3. Elie Kapengut & Bruce Mizrach, 2023. "An Event Study of the Ethereum Transition to Proof-of-Stake," Commodities, MDPI, vol. 2(2), pages 1-15, March.
    4. Gurdgiev, Constantin & O’Loughlin, Daniel, 2020. "Herding and anchoring in cryptocurrency markets: Investor reaction to fear and uncertainty," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 25(C).
    5. Albert S. Hu & Christine A. Parlour & Uday Rajan, 2019. "Cryptocurrencies: Stylized facts on a new investible instrument," Financial Management, Financial Management Association International, vol. 48(4), pages 1049-1068, December.
    6. Katsiampa, Paraskevi, 2017. "Volatility estimation for Bitcoin: A comparison of GARCH models," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 158(C), pages 3-6.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alessio Brini & Jimmie Lenz, 2024. "A comparison of cryptocurrency volatility-benchmarking new and mature asset classes," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 10(1), pages 1-38, December.
    2. Mudassar Hasan & Muhammad Abubakr Naeem & Muhammad Arif & Syed Jawad Hussain Shahzad & Xuan Vinh Vo, 2022. "Liquidity connectedness in cryptocurrency market," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 8(1), pages 1-25, December.
    3. Gradojevic, Nikola & Tsiakas, Ilias, 2021. "Volatility cascades in cryptocurrency trading," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 252-265.
    4. Alessio Brini & Jimmie Lenz, 2024. "A Comparison of Cryptocurrency Volatility-benchmarking New and Mature Asset Classes," Papers 2404.04962, arXiv.org.
    5. Hau, Liya & Zhu, Huiming & Shahbaz, Muhammad & Sun, Wuqin, 2021. "Does transaction activity predict Bitcoin returns? Evidence from quantile-on-quantile analysis," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 55(C).
    6. Aurelio F. Bariviera & Ignasi Merediz‐Solà, 2021. "Where Do We Stand In Cryptocurrencies Economic Research? A Survey Based On Hybrid Analysis," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(2), pages 377-407, April.
    7. Nikolaos A. Kyriazis, 2021. "A Survey on Volatility Fluctuations in the Decentralized Cryptocurrency Financial Assets," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-46, June.
    8. Abakah, Emmanuel Joel Aikins & Gil-Alana, Luis Alberiko & Madigu, Godfrey & Romero-Rojo, Fatima, 2020. "Volatility persistence in cryptocurrency markets under structural breaks," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 680-691.
    9. Yin, Libo & Nie, Jing & Han, Liyan, 2021. "Understanding cryptocurrency volatility: The role of oil market shocks," International Review of Economics & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 233-253.
    10. Almeida, José & Gonçalves, Tiago Cruz, 2023. "A systematic literature review of investor behavior in the cryptocurrency markets," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Elsevier, vol. 37(C).
    11. Jalan, Akanksha & Matkovskyy, Roman & Urquhart, Andrew & Yarovaya, Larisa, 2023. "The role of interpersonal trust in cryptocurrency adoption," Journal of International Financial Markets, Institutions and Money, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    12. Ahmad Harith Ashrofie Hanafi & Mohd Shahid Azim Mohd Saufi & Muhammad Zarunnaim Haji Wahab & Suheil Che Sobry & Mohd Hilal Muhammad, 2024. "Bridging the Gap: A Bibliometric Review of Cryptocurrency and Conventional Market Interactions in Academic Research," International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science, International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS), vol. 8(9), pages 1114-1131, September.
    13. Lee Alan Smales, 2020. "One Cryptocurrency to Explain Them All? Understanding the Importance of Bitcoin in Cryptocurrency Returns," Economic Papers, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 39(2), pages 118-132, June.
    14. Paola Stolfi & Mauro Bernardi & Davide Vergni, 2022. "Robust estimation of time-dependent precision matrix with application to the cryptocurrency market," Financial Innovation, Springer;Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, vol. 8(1), pages 1-25, December.
    15. Cao, Guangxi & Xie, Wenhao, 2021. "The impact of the shutdown policy on the asymmetric interdependence structure and risk transmission of cryptocurrency and China’s financial market," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).
    16. Constandina Koki & Stefanos Leonardos & Georgios Piliouras, 2020. "Exploring the Predictability of Cryptocurrencies via Bayesian Hidden Markov Models," Papers 2011.03741, arXiv.org, revised Dec 2020.
    17. Aiman Hairudin & Azhar Mohamad, 2024. "The isotropy of cryptocurrency volatility," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 3779-3810, July.
    18. Arouxet, M. Belén & Bariviera, Aurelio F. & Pastor, Verónica E. & Vampa, Victoria, 2022. "Covid-19 impact on cryptocurrencies: Evidence from a wavelet-based Hurst exponent," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 596(C).
    19. Dias, Ishanka K. & Fernando, J.M. Ruwani & Fernando, P. Narada D., 2022. "Does investor sentiment predict bitcoin return and volatility? A quantile regression approach," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    20. Tan, Chia-Yen & Koh, You-Beng & Ng, Kok-Haur & Ng, Kooi-Huat, 2021. "Dynamic volatility modelling of Bitcoin using time-varying transition probability Markov-switching GARCH model," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 56(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Cryptocurrency; Ethereum; ETH; crypto whales; blockchain; pump-and-dump;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • G14 - Financial Economics - - General Financial Markets - - - Information and Market Efficiency; Event Studies; Insider Trading
    • G23 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Non-bank Financial Institutions; Financial Instruments; Institutional Investors
    • G28 - Financial Economics - - Financial Institutions and Services - - - Government Policy and Regulation
    • G41 - Financial Economics - - Behavioral Finance - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making in Financial Markets

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:fip:fedpwp:98653. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Beth Paul (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/frbphus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.