exchanges don't publicly announce who has bought how much bitcoin from them, that would be illegal. and there is a lot of different ways to buy bitcoin than going to one place and buying it in one chunk!
besides in 2016 the price was mostly around $500 and as low as $300 and 1000BTC would have been $300k to $500k which is not that big when accumulated over time.
and why do you choose 2016? i prefer using 2015 which was the bottom (similar to 2019) and price was as low as $150 while residing in $200 range for a long time. 1000BTC would have been as low as $150k. and that is without trading profit.
you have to be either a developer to have any "weight" or start a centralized company which goes against bitcoin to have any "weight".
besides one thing that is important for many bitcoin users is privacy. and bitcoin technology created in 2008 is already good and doesn't need growing.
when newbies panic sell or refuse to buy when price is low it is not the system's fault or the whales evil plan!
for example i remember back in 2014 when i started most newbies were adamant that price will never go up and weren't buying at prices between $150 and $500 and look where we are now. you can even find their topics talking about falling down to $20.
nobody forced them at gunpoint to not buy bitcoin or blind them to see bitcoin's potential or the "technology". it was their own damn choice.
this will happen all over again in about 3 or 4 years when people complain about "whales" having lots of bitcoin while it costs them something like a million bucks to buy 10 bitcoins!