How do whales keep their massive amounts of bitcoin?

Viscore

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

It would be safer if you split it into different wallet, regardless if its hardware or coldware, as long as you keep them safe and private all their seed phrases. Storing all your assets in just a single wallet is more risky, once your account is hack or stolen, all your assets will be lost too. It’s like diversifying your investments into crypto, stocks or bonds, the more you diversify, the more secure your profits are. As long as you never go wrong into putting all your investments profits, it will always be safe and secured.

hZti

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Quote from: hosseinimr93 on August 06, 2022, 01:49:22 PM

Quote from: kryptqnick on August 06, 2022, 01:40:33 PM

If you're using a non-custodial wallet and you have your passphrase in a safe location, that's it.

What you are talking about is called seed phrase, not passphrase.
Passphrase is an extra word or characters added to your seed phrase for more security.

It is still always advisable to also write down the passphrase if you encrypt your wallet (what you also should do). There are many unexpected ways that can make you forget your wallet details (surgery, car accident, etc.)

hosseinimr93

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Quote from: kryptqnick on August 06, 2022, 01:40:33 PM

If you're using a non-custodial wallet and you have your passphrase in a safe location, that's it.

What you are talking about is called seed phrase, not passphrase.
Passphrase is an extra word or characters added to your seed phrase for more security.

Quote from: kryptqnick on August 06, 2022, 01:40:33 PM

the company to which the wallet belongs has zero access to your money.

You can't be sure of that if the wallet is close-source.
For example, in a close-source non-custodial wallet like trustwallet, you have full control over your keys. But there is no way to know whether you are the only one who has access to the keys or not.

kryptqnick

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If you're using a non-custodial wallet and you have your passphrase in a safe location, that's it. You can't be hacked (unless you open your wallet on some device and it has malware), the company to which the wallet belongs has zero access to your money. It's totally secure, and given that the passphrase can't be 'guessed' with current levels of computing power, that's it. That being said, I think that if it's a big amount, it would make sense to diversify to a couple of different wallets, just in case you accidentally lose access to one of them my misplacing a passphrase or if someone somehow gets to it.

m2017

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

To answer these questions, need to be whale yourself. I have some doubts that whales are found in these parts and therefore, it is naive to expect answers from those who are not whale. Although, who knows, maybe there are, we just don't know about it.

Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

It is impossible to say 100% for sure, but storage on the hardwallet is safe, because so far there have been no unpleasant incidents with the loss of funds from it. Millions of people use hardwallet, but if it's safer for you, then no one forbids storing btc on several wallets. It is not necessary to follow the examples of whales for this.

ethereumhunter

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

Every whale has its own way of protecting its bitcoins and we will never know its plans. Maybe they can explain what the plan is but not with details because it's their secret.

But if I were a whale and had, let's say 1000 BTC that I just made from trading, I would split it into pieces.

I'll be using 1/3 on Trezor, 1/3 on Ledger, 1/3 on Bitcoin Core, and a few small pieces in the wallet I have on my phone. And the rest of the rest I will keep in my trading account to trade again and try to make more BTC.

The way you use it is fine to keep everything in one wallet if that makes you comfortable. But if not, you can divide it into several parts. It's all about convenience in storing all your BTC; you need to find it yourself.

TheNineClub

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

Hardware wallets, but that's just only part of it. The big part is that they segment their savings in numerous wallets to keep them as safe as possible. I think everyone learned from that one guy who threw away his hard drive with like a ton of BTC on it and then wanted to obtain a permit from the government to go look for it on a waste dump site XD. Not everyone can afford multiple wallets, but that's the best option.

kamvreto

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Quote from: darkangel11 on August 03, 2022, 01:51:35 PM

~snip~Since these people are very open about their investments they know they could become a target for burglars and such, so you won't catch them with something like a wallet on their phones, or carrying a thumb drive with all that stuff. They're going to have manager who holds the money in a deposit box in some vault and can access it only via secure connection in that vault.

open in what sense? certainly not open to the public, some whales don't even want to be exposed about the investments they make because on the grounds that they will become targets for theft and hacking, it's very dangerous. Whales or those who have a large number of bitcoins will of course also have a company that will manage these investment assets and have a security system that is certainly better and has several managers who will manage these assets.
there are many other ways that whales use to keep their assets more secure and controlled.

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

The part of the sentence which I bolded made your statement sound like it is the company that's going to be in charge of the bitcoins you keep in the wallet, I personally think you should understand that when it comes to non-custodial wallets, the company have nothing to do with how much bitcoin you decide to keep in your wallet, your coins are your coins, as long as you are in charge of your private key, you can decide to keep your bitcoin in one hard wallet or divide them across multiple hard ware wallets from different brands, it doesn't matter as long as those wallets are non-custodial.

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

If you can afford 3 hardware wallets, I think that such a strategy is not bad in the sense that you reduce the risk that would arise from the possibility that one of the manufacturers will at some point be exposed to a critical vulnerability because of which you could potentially lose your BTC. Or you can simply create a cold wallet and not trust any company.

tbct_mt2

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

They would store their Bitcoin in different wallets and with different wallet types.

It is risky if you use only one wallet brand to store your Bitcoin. Always blackswan event can happen.
It is less risky if you store your Bitcoin in different wallets (with different keys/seeds) with one wallet brand.
It is more less risky if you store your Bitcoin in different wallets with different wallet brand.

So if one brand has issue, you still have Bitcoin in wallets from other brands.

darkangel11

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Many of them use custodial services. I think that it was discussed somewhere that many of them use Coinbase or funds that manage their money for them and those funds have licenses and insurance.
You wouldn't expect people like Michael Saylor to have a ledger with a billion dollars in his home safe, behind a painting Cheesy

Since these people are very open about their investments they know they could become a target for burglars and such, so you won't catch them with something like a wallet on their phones, or carrying a thumb drive with all that stuff. They're going to have manager who holds the money in a deposit box in some vault and can access it only via secure connection in that vault.

jackg

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As said above, for large amounts whales and large companies would generally use airgapped devices now (and some may still have cold wallets t if they're scared of moving their funds to an online machine but those aren't considered very safe anymore). It's possible to also use hardware wallets on an airgapped machine but I'm not sure if this is done much (it may be an extra layer of protection in case files unsigned transactions are transferred via removable storage from the online device to the offline one).

hZti

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Since the wallet in general is connected to the private key and not the wallet hardware there is no point in using different hardware. You could however create multiple wallets with the same hardware if you want to. Also you could use multisig.

noorman0

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In response to the title: Uncertain, if they follow the recommended method of securing bitcoins should separate them into several non-custodial wallets for a certain amount limit say >5BTC or (if not) move them regularly to a new wallet.

Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

-snip-
but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

Safe from theft/loss? It depends on how you secure your device, PIN, seeds, and other recovery features.
Safe from tracking? Probably not, even more so if you're a verified user.

Eternad

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

Cold wallets is designed for user like whale holders that have huge assets in there wallet because it’s the safest wallet. Whales have different perspective and opinion about protecting there money. Maybe some of them is spreading there Bitcoin in multiple wallet and some is using just one wallet to easily securing it. Having multiple wallet means you have multiple assets that needs to be protected. The only advantage of using multiple wallet was you can’t loss everything with one hack.

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

I don't think that a real whale keeps all his coins on hardware wallets. Cold storage, maybe with multisig would be the proper way. Also splitting, especially to not attract attention for the amount held in one address, may be in order. HW is great for smaller amounts, like what they'd keep with them when going out.
However, I would also not be surprised if there are whales keeping their coins at exchanges (!), especially in order to use them for trading, earning more, and, why not, manipulating the market a little when they can. Clearly, I talk here about whales who don't rely only on bitcoin for having all the goods they want in this life.

But.. this is how I imagine them. How do they behave in reality... we may never know.

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Quote from: feeling sound on August 03, 2022, 06:02:42 AM

Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

If you own thousands of BTC, you most probably want a dedicated, airgapped machine that uses nothing but Bitcoin Core or Electrum to generate addresses where you deposit your funds.
Whenever you want to spend them, you create the transaction, put it on a flash drive, bring that flash drive to a different machine which does have internet access and broadcast it from there. You will also want your own node such that when broadcasting large Bitcoin transactions to the Bitcoin network, they aren't tied to your IP address - something that can put you at personal / targeted risk of attacks (digital and physical).

You will also absolutely want to look into multisig through multiple such airgapped, cold storage machines.

My guess though, is that some of the large Bitcoin investors don't do this, instead they are probably so wealthy that they leave their BTC with an exchange or personal broker, in an insured fashion. Such that if the funds go missing or anything else happens to them, they can sue them to death. Just a hypothesis, though.

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Either Trezor, Ledger and BitBox02 are safe as long as you bought from official store/retail and never share your seeds to anyone else.

It doesn't really matter to keep everything in one wallet or split into different wallets, if just matter of how convenience and how you can keep all the seeds safe. I'd prefer to split on 3 different wallet, but not all were a hardware wallet.

I split for 5% coins to my web wallet, it's used to trading or buy something in online marketplace, another 15% to my hardware wallet that much often used and the rest 80% to my second hardware that I never touch since it's used for long term holding.

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Do they use cold wallets for it like everyone else? If so, do they keep everything in one wallet or do they split the bitcoin into several different wallets?

Let's say 1/3 in Trezor, 1/3 in Ledger, 1/3 in BitBox02? I'm currently trying to transfer my bitcoin from an exchange to a cold wallet for the first time, but I'm wondering if it's safe to keep everything in one wallet from one company.

Topic: How do whales keep their massive amounts of bitcoin? (Read 304 times)