A “whale” is a person who has a significant amount of certain crypto. Whales in the crypto realm cause waves and disruptions, ripple out to fish and smaller players, altering the broader market. Although there is no clear cutoff point for this definition, some believe that a Bitcoin whale should have at least 1,000 BTC.
A whale is also someone who has enough money or tokens to have a significant impact on market pricing, either by buying or selling huge quantities. Whales can also cause demand and supply speculation among small fish, impacting the market and making it turbulent.
Although we commonly refer to a wealthy individual as a whale, the word can also refer to an institution or group that owns a large number of crypto and hence has the ability to influence market movements. In the crypto realm, investment firms like Pantera Capital, Fortress Investment Group, and Falcon Global Capital are examples of such whales.
Satoshi Nakamoto, Tim Draper, Barry Silbert, and The Winklevoss Twins are some of the rumored individual whales.
In practice, however, most significant players avoid trading on traditional crypto exchanges since their enormous orders could overload the available order books. Instead, they use Over-the-Counter trading to buy and sell coins off the exchange books.
