Satoshi Nakamoto is now richer than Bill Gates

Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous developer of Bitcoin, is now worth more than Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft. 

At the time of writing, Nakamoto’s Arkham entity has holdings of over $125 billion whilst Bill Gates fortune is $118 billion according to Forbes. 

Nakamoto’s supposed net worth is based entirely on the approximately 22,000 addresses linked to the Bitcoin creator and compiled into one entity on the Arkham Intel platform. These 22,000 addresses were identified using a clustering pattern known as the Patoshi Pattern, which infers the identities of miners on the blockchain via a privacy flaw in the early Bitcoin clients.

Based on this method, Nakamoto has 1.096M BTC tokens which represents over 5% of the current circulating supply. 

Despite Satoshi Nakamoto’s enormous fortune, if wallets linked to the Bitcoin creator were ever to start offloading Bitcoin, the market reaction would be severe and likely cause a huge crash in the price of Bitcoin. 

Depending on the scale and speed of the sales, and the reasons behind it, the sale of BTC by Nakamoto could spell the end for Bitcoin. Satoshi Nakamoto’s wealth is highly illiquid. 

Bill Gates' wealth, on the other hand, is highly diversified. A large chunk (approximately $40 billion) comes from the 1.3% of Microsoft shares he owns. Microsoft is worth $3.88 trillion and is the second most valuable company in the world. Nvidia is the most valuable and currently the only $4 trillion company.

Bill Gates’ portfolio is managed by a holding company called Cascade Investments. Cascade has holdings in Berkshire Hathaway, it also invests in start-ups, and owns significant real estate assets. 

Separately, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also has substantial assets which are part of Bill Gates’ wealth strategy. He has donated over $59 billion to the foundation.