The Supply Transparency Report brings visibility to the actions of the key categories of a cryptoasset’s holders that are deemed to restrict supply from the market, as defined in the CMBI Float Adjustment Methodology.
The current universe of cryptoassets that are covered in this report is reflective of those that Coin Metrics administers Free Float Supply values for, which includes: 0x, Basic Attention Token, Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Bitcoin Gold, Bitcoin SV, Cardano, Chainlink, Crypto.com Coin, DASH, Decred, Digibyte, Dogecoin, Ethereum, Ethereum Classic, FTX Token, Huobi Token, Litecoin, MakerDAO, NEO, Stellar, Tezos, XRP and Zcash.
Note, for all of the monthly and quarterly U.S. Dollar values herein, an approximate aggregate quarterly value has been calculated by taking the net supply added or removed each day and multiplying it by that specific date’s Coin Metrics End of Day (00:00 UTC) Reference Rate.
The additional net value added to cryptoasset markets through Q3 2020 was $1.17B, down 14% from the previous quarter ($1.36B). The largest contributors to Q3’s increase in value can be attributed to Bitcoin ($402M), XRP ($304M) and NEO ($113M).
The cryptoassets with the highest free float annual inflation rate over the last year were FTX Coin (256%), Crypto.com Coin (142%), Zcash (41%) and 0x (24%). Over the same period, Huobi Token (-22%), MakerDAO (-4.8%), Dogecoin (0.3%) and Bitcoin (1.9%) had the lowest annual inflation rate.
The net value of cryptoassets that moved outside of identified Foundation/Company controlled addresses was $590M during Q3 2020, down from $743M during the previous quarter (21% or $153M less). The primary reason for the reduction this quarter is attributed to the reduction in transfers from Company owned Crypto.com Coin addresses, which moved $113M in Q3 compared to $459M in Q2. The largest net changes to Foundation/Company controlled addresses in Q3 2020 were XRP ($199M), Crypto.com Coin ($113M), NEO ($111M) and FTX Coin ($59M).
Note: Company/Foundation asset sales can be conducted for many reasons, including but not limited to operating expenses, team member/advisor vesting, strategic long term partnership/BD, scheduled and unscheduled token burns, strategic investments and treasury management. Companies/Foundations may also behave differently, either choosing to issue large volumes infrequently or issue on an as needs basis. Further, movement of assets from Foundation/Company controlled addresses does not necessarily mean assets have been sold (e.g. distribution to team members, burns, strategic placements, community incentive programs, etc).
Note 2: In November 2019, Stellar Foundation burned $4.14B worth of XLM
The net value of cryptoassets that moved outside of identified Company Team addresses was $77.3M during Q3 2020, up a staggering $67.9M from the previous quarter (724%). However, during the Q2 there were $84.6M CRO deposited into Crypto.com Coin team addresses, without which the net value of cryptoassets that moved outside of Company Team controlled addresses would have been $161.8M, up from $76.5M in Q2 if you also exclude the Crypto.com Coin team address deposits of $67.1M. The largest net changes to Team controlled addresses in Q3 2020 were XRP ($105M), Chainlink ($58.8M), Ethereum ($4.5M) and Crypto.com Coin (-$84.6M).
Note: Movement out of Team controlled addresses does not necessarily mean assets have been sold, but rather can be an indication of activity (e.g. movement to passive yield generating tools such as Compound).
Free Float Supply Overview
0x (ZRX)
During Q3 2020, ZRX Foundation transactions resulted in a total of 44.9M ZRX leaving company controlled addresses. This value was largely in line with Q1 and Q2, where ZRX that left foundation controlled addresses was 46.1M and 39.8M respectively. Similar to Q2, whilst this value left foundation addresses, a significant portion (30M) was sent to the Compound smart contracts to presumably earn yield on treasury assets (observed here and here).
Identified core team member/contributor addresses significantly reduced their activity in Q3, with net transactions resulting in a reduction of only 304K ZRX. By contrast, during the first two quarters, team member activity resulted in 10.6M ZRX being removed from team member addresses.
The net impact of Foundation and Team ZRX transactions was an increase to the Free Float Supply of 45.2M ZRX, a slight decrease from the previous quarter (45.9M) but a significant increase from the same quarter in 2019 (1.8M).
Basic Attention Token (BAT)
Throughout Q3, the rate of Basic Attention Token free float inflation continued to increase, with 37.8M new BAT entering circulation. This quarter’s net outflows of restricted supply represent the fourth consecutive increase and represent over twice the amount transacted from restricted addresses in Q3 2019 (17.0M BAT).
The majority of restricted supply that entered the market can be attributed to the ‘BAT: UPG Reserve’, which withdrew a total of 34.7M BAT, sending the majority to Uphold.com tagged addresses. This is the most foundation addresses have withdrawn since Q4 2018. By contrast, identified team addresses activity was the lowest this year with the net outflows of 3.0M BAT, down from 7.1M BAT in Q2 and 4.5M BAT in Q1.
Bitcoin (BTC)
Q3 2020 was the first quarter where the full impacts of the recent Bitcoin halving can be observed from the new supply that came into the market through mining related activities. During the quarter, only 85,256 new BTC was mined, down from 121K in Q2 and 164K in Q1.
Despite 85.3K BTC entering the market, Bitcoin’s Free Float Supply only increased 38.8K, bringing the total free float supply to 14.36M at the end of the quarter.
The reason for this is that during Q3, 46,488 BTC became supply that is considered restricted to markets as defined in the CMBI Adjusted Free Float Methodology. The underlying reason for this is that UTXOs that consisted of 46,488 BTC aged over 5 years. Under the methodology, these are now considered to be restricted from markets and belonging to either long term strategic investors, or lost.
Bitcoin Cash (BCH)
Bitcoin Cash had its first full quarter where the full impacts of the recent Bitcoin Cash halving can be observed. During the quarter, 82.6M BCH entered free float supply through mining related activities.
Bitcoin Cash’s free float supply increased 116.0K through Q3, which also represents 33.4K BCH that became activated for the first time ever since the Bitcoin/Bitcoin Cash fork in August 2017. This represents a relatively small amount of BCH activated, down from a quarterly average of 68.0K over the last year.
Bitcoin Gold (BTG)
Bitcoin Gold Free Float increased the most of all Bitcoin forks, rising 261.5K BTG throughout Q3. Similar to the other Bitcoin’s only 82.5K BTG entered the market through mining activities, a slow down from previous quarters due to the halving that took place during Q2. However, it was the large amount of BTG (179.0K) that became active for the first time ever since the Bitcoin/Bitcoin Gold fork that resulted in the large increase in free float. This number is up significantly from Q2 (32.1K), but in line with the quarterly average over the last year (169.9K).
Bitcoin SV (BSV)
Bitcoin SV’s free float supply increased 160.8K during Q3 2020. The new issuance of Bitcoin SV from mining related activities was 82.6K BSV during Q3. As with all Bitcoin forks, this was the first quarter where only 6.25 BSV were mined per block, representing a 50% reduction from prior to the halving. The other 78.2K BSV was from new supply that was only activated for the first time since the Bitcoin Cash/Bitcoin SV fork. This amount is in line with Q2, but is significantly less than the quarterly average over the last year (256K).
Cardano (ADA)
Cardano underwent a significant protocol change this quarter, Shelley, which introduced a Proof of Stake consensus and a mechanism for inflation that previously did not exist. This resulted in the total on-chain supply of Cardano increasing for the first time in its history, up 552.7M ADA from the previous quarter. Previously quarterly on-chain supply decreased as a result of the burning of transaction fees.
The free float supply of Cardano increased 616.5M during Q3, a significant increase from the quarterly average of the prior 3 quarters (110M). The net outflows from foundation identified addresses of 158.5M represented a 148% increase from the previous quarter, but was less than in Q1 of 2020 (175.7M). However, of this, Coin Metrics identified a potential distribution to team members after the launch of Shelley, worth 64.7M ADA.
Chainlink (LINK)
Chainlink’s Free Float Supply increased 5.0M LINK throughout Q3, an increase of 2.0M from the previous quarter. The entirety of the increase in free float supply can be attributed to transactions from team identified addresses. This represents the largest quarterly amount of LINK that team addresses have withdrawn in the last year, but not as much as Q3 of 2019 where team addresses withdrew 12.6M LINK.
Crypto.com Coin (CRO)
During Q2 2020, the Free Float Supply of CRO increased 186.2M, significantly less and the quarterly average (2.1B) over the last year. This quarterly reduction in free float inflation is largely due to lower activity levels from Company identified addresses, which had net outflows of 679.2M, down from 7.1B in the previous quarter.
DASH (DASH)
DASH’s issuance rate adjusted to ~6.0% during Q2 which resulted in the lowest amount of new supply from mining related activity, 159.5K DASH. During the quarter, supply that has been inactive for over 5 years and identified as belonging to long term strategic investors or lost supply was 22.8K. The net result of the two aforementioned factors was an increase in DASH’s free float supply of 136.7K for the quarter.
Decred (DCR)
Another 375.8K DCR was added to the Free Float Supply during Q3 2020, with 381.5K coming from newly mined DCR. After three quarters of net outflows from foundation wallets, Foundation controlled addresses increased their DCR supply 5.7K during Q3.
For the second month running, identified Decred team member’s addresses did not have any deposit or withdrawals during the quarter.
Digibyte (DGB)
The Free Float Supply of Digibyte increased 398.0M DGB in Q3, an increase of 157% from Q2 and above the last year’s quarterly average of 284.2M. This increase above previous quarters is largely the result of a net outflow from long term strategic holder balances of 93.7M DGB. This along with the 304.2M DGB that entered supply from mining related activity were the two contributors to the increase in free float.
Dogecoin (DOGE)
Dogecoin returned to deflation during Q3, with 138.0M DOGE removed from its free float supply. Whilst new DOGE continues to be mined every block, to the sum of 1.3B during the Q3, addresses with a total of 1.4B DOGE were identified as inactive for over 5 years during the quarter. This supply is considered to belong to long term strategic holders or lost, as defined in the CMBI Adjusted Free Float Methodology.
Ethereum (ETH)
For the first time since 2015, Ethereum’s Free Float Supply decreased during Q3 2020, falling 640.9K ETH, a stark contrast to the 5 consecutive quarters of ~1.2M ETH growth per quarter. As flagged in last quarter’s report, Ethereum turned 5 years old this quarter, which ushered in the first of its supply (1.9M ETH) to be categorized as belonging to long term strategic investors or lost supply and restricted from liquid markets.
With the increase in hash rate during the quarter, 1.25M new on-chain ETH was created through mining activities, up 4% for the quarter. Nominal amounts of ETH totaling 23K were transacted from foundation and team addresses during the quarter.
Ethereum Classic (ETC)
The Free Float Supply of Ethereum Classic increased 2.0M ETC during Q3 2020. Over 99% of this came from new issuance from mining activities, whilst only 7K ETC was activated for the first time since the fork.
FTX Token (FTT)
During Q3, the free float supply of FTX Token increased 12.7M, in line with the quarterly average over the last year. FTX continues to conduct weekly off-chain burns, which resulted in a reduction in the on-chain supply of 1.3M FTT. As has been the case for the last year, despite the burns, the increase in free float has been the result of FTX Treasury continuing to incur net outflows which totaled 14.0M FTT during the quarter.
Huobi Token (HT)
Huobi Token’s Free Float Supply reduced by 7.6M during Q3 2020. Huobi continues to burn HT on-chain, sending tokens to the 0x0000000000000000000000000000000000000000 burn address which received 10.2M HT during the quarter. This is slightly less than the previous three quarters which saw an average of ~13M HT sent to the burn address, noting that there was also a one off burn of 147M HT from the Platform Operations and the Investor Protection Fund in Q1 2020. Also contributing to the free float supply was Huobi Global identified addresses, which had net outflows of 2.5M HT.
Litecoin (LTC)
Litecoin’s free float supply increased 533.7K LTC during Q3, an increase from the previous quarter (400.3K), but in line with the quarterly average over the previous year (504.6K). The newly mined supply of LTC from mining related activities was in line with Q2, totaling 665.9K LTC, but there were 132.2K LTC that was held in addresses that aged 5 years without having demonstrated activity.
MakerDAO (MKR)
The Free Float Supply of MakerDAO fell by 1.1K MKR during Q3 2020. The largest contributing category of stakeholders to this change was a net increase of 11.1K MKR in participation in the ‘Maker: Governance Contract’, which is considered to restrict supply, as defined in the CMBI Adjusted Free Float Methodology. However, offsetting this was net outflows of 10,000 MKR from the MkarDAO foundation in Q3.
Unlike the previous two quarters, there was no change to the amount of MKR issued on-chain.
NEO (NEO)
The NEO free float supply had its largest quarterly increase ever during Q3, with 5.5M NEO entering the markets. This new supply came in large from Foundation owned and controlled addresses which experienced net outflows of 5.4M (of a total 41.9M). Most of this 5.5M from the foundation address was sent to interact with NEO’s new DeFi application, Flamingo (largest foundation transaction here).
A further 50K NEO was withdrawn from team identified addresses which looks to have been sent to an exchange address.
Stellar Lumens (XLM)
Stellar Lumen free float supply increased 583.3M XLM during Q3 2020, which was almost entirely the result of net XLM outflows from foundation controlled addresses to more liquid addresses (583.5M). During September, the Stellar Lumen network turned 5 years old, which resulted in the first addresses which have not displayed activity in 5 years appearing on-chain. This resulted in 0.2M XLM being removed from free float during the quarter.
Tezos (XTZ)
The Tezos total on-chain supply increased 20.0M during Q3 as a result of the Baking process and individuals that continue to claim from the ICO back in 2018. Of this, 1.8M was baked by Tezos Foundation addresses, resulting in an 18.2M increase to the free float supply throughout the quarter (+20.0M to current supply – 1.8M restricted supply belonging to the foundation).
XRP (XRP)
XRP free float supply increased 1.2B during Q3 2020, a slight decrease from the previous quarter where 1.35B entered free float supply. The largest contributor of extra liquidity to the market during the quarter was the Ripple Foundation, whose addresses had a net outflow of 0.8B tokens, a fairly significant portion of which ended up on exchanges. This represents a decrease in the Foundation net outflows which for the previous two quarters had been 1.1B. There was also a 33% increase this quarter in the amount of XRP that left addresses controlled by Founding Team members, up to 402.8M XRP from 307.3M in Q2 and 121.4M in Q1. There were also 5M XRP that were in addresses that became categorized as long term strategic holders/lost after having not displayed activity in over 5 years.
Zcash (ZEC)
Zcash free float supply increased 615.9K ZEC during Q3, its lowest quarterly change in the last year (average of 646K quarterly). There were 659.2K new ZEC issued on-chain through mining related activities, which is in line with previous quarters figures. However, it was the relatively low level of net outflows from foundation identified addresses that resulted in the reduction in free float supply.
Foundation addresses, which are considered restricted supply, had net inflows of 43.3K ZEC during Q3. Each of the previous three quarters, the foundation addresses had net outflows, averaging 2K ZEC per quarter. Zcash foundation addresses receive 1.25 ZEC per block mined, which results in inflows of ~66K ZEC per quarter.
Detailed Free Float Breakdown
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