We use a multi-source approach: (1) Public disclosures from exchanges/institutions (e.g., Coinbase cold wallet addresses published in transparency reports), (2) Blockchain clustering heuristics (common input ownership, change address detection), (3) Law enforcement disclosures (e.g., Silk Road seizure addresses), (4) Research from firms like Chainalysis and Glassnode. Each attribution includes a confidence level: Verified (direct source), High (multiple corroborating sources), Medium (heuristic-based), or Estimated (behavioral inference).

Exchange cold wallets hold customer funds in custody—they're not owned by the exchange itself. For example, Binance's ~643K BTC represents deposits from millions of users. This is why we distinguish "Exchange" type addresses: they reflect custody volume, not corporate treasury. Watch for net flows (deposits vs withdrawals) rather than absolute balances for market sentiment signals.

Movement from Satoshi-era addresses would be a historic event. Potential impacts: (1) Immediate market volatility due to uncertainty about seller intent, (2) Media frenzy and renewed debate about Bitcoin's decentralization, (3) Possible regulatory scrutiny if linked to an identifiable entity. However, most analysts believe these coins are effectively "lost" (private keys inaccessible), making movement extremely unlikely. Our tracker provides real-time alerts for any activity from early-mined addresses.

USD values use a volume-weighted average price (VWAP) across major exchanges (Coinbase, Binance, Kraken) updated every 60 seconds. This minimizes manipulation risk from single-exchange anomalies. Note: Large whale movements can temporarily impact VWAP—our charts show both real-time and 5-minute smoothed prices for context.