Cryptocurrency Detectives Point To Robinhood As Dogecoin Whale

Photographer: Yuriko Nakao / Getty Images

There is a prime suspect as to who owns the world’s largest Dogecoin cryptocurrency wallet and it’s a name that should be familiar: Robinhood Markets.

The timing of the creation of the initial digital wallet used for storage in June 2018 tracks with Robinhood’s offering Dogecoin trading to its clients in July this year. This is according to the Elliptic blockchain data tracker and picked up by online detectives on Reddit’s Dogecoin forum.

“He almost certainly belongs to Robinhood,” said Tom Robinson, chief scientist and co-founder of Elliptic. “The times for its creation and the creation of the addresses for which it received funds correspond to Robinhood’s support schedules at Dogecoin.”

Dogecoin has jumped more than 950% since the start of the year, going from less than half a dime to over five cents per coin, as Reddit users flocked to cryptocurrency based on the meme of a smiling Shiba Inu.

The owner of the wallet, who controls nearly 29% of Dogecoin in circulation, has become a subject of attention after Tesla Inc. CEO Elon Musk tweeted that “too much focus” is the only real problem with cryptocurrency before saying he would pay the biggest holders to “cancel their accounts.”

Musk tweeted Tuesday his suspicions that Robinhood could be the biggest holder, then later backed calls to Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev to explain the broker’s previous decisions to curb the trading of GameStop Corp. shares. and Dogecoin during the January market mania.

As attention intensified on Wednesday around who owned the largest Dogecoin wallet, Robinhood tweeted that he would not confirm which addresses belonged to them.

A Robinhood spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.