In ModoEmprendedor we have talked on several occasions about the most recognized millionaires. But at this time, where the cryptographic world is becoming more relevant, the cryptomillionaires.
On this occasion, we will focus exclusively on crypto millionaires who made their fortunes purely with cryptocurrencies. I make the clarification, because I know that there are millionaires who have part of their fortune in cryptocurrencies.
This is the case of Michael Saylor, co-founder of Micro Strategy, a renowned software and cloud services company. Which became popular because he began to invest heavily in Bitcoin. However, Saylor’s wealth is largely due to his stake in Micro Strategy stock.
It is also necessary to clarify that the cryptomillionaires that you will see below are not organized by order of wealth. This is due to 2 reasons:
- The volatility of cryptocurrencies means that the ranking can change quite quickly.
- The official amount of cryptocurrencies that each one owns is not public information (at least not in all cases). So absolute values, it’s virtually impossible to have; but it is possible to arrive at estimated values based on interviews, documents published in legal proceedings, tokenomics, tweets and more.
With this clear, let’s see the top of cryptomillionaires.
Top Cryptomillionaires and how they achieved their fortunes.
Tim Draper
Tim Draper is a well-known Silicon Valley venture capitalist and founder of Draper Associates, DFJ, and the Draper Venture Network, a global network of venture capital funds.
Some of his best known investments include those made to Focus Media, YeePay, KongZhong, Skype, Hotmail, Tesla, SolarCity, Coinbase, Ledger, Robinhood, Athenahealth, Box, TwitchTV, SpaceX, Cruise Automation, Carta, Planet, PTC and plus.
In 2014, Draper made one of the best decisions of his life, when he bought nearly 30,000 bitcoins seized by US Marshals Services from the now-defunct online black market, Silk Road.
That same year the BTC cost approximately 500 dollars, Draper predicted the price rise to 10,000 in the next 3 years and the future proved him right.
Max Keiser
His investing career began in the 1980s when he worked as a stockbroker at an investment bank in New York.
His experience on Wall Street made him a quite popular critic of the current financial system and its currencies (dollar, euro, etc.), since they are constantly devalued. As a result of this, in 2011 when he heard about BTC and it only cost 1 dollar, he bought quite a few. For him, the “new” cryptocurrency would become digital gold.
In 2013, on his popular “Kaiser Report” show, he announced that he had become a millionaire thanks to Bitcoin. It should be noted that on the day the video was published, the BTC cost 43 dollars.
Vitalik Buterin
This crypto millionaire is none other than the founder of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, who currently owns more than 325 thousand Ether. Vitalik has also said that he has Bitcoin and other altcoins in his possession.
It is possible to know exactly how much ether Vitalik has (at least in this wallet) because he shared the address in 2018 to prove that he had never had more than 1% of ether in circulation, after some users accused him of engaging in malpractice.
Vitalik first learned about cryptocurrencies from his father, who told him about Bitcoin in 2011. A few months later, he began writing for Bitcoin Magazine and became one of its co-founders.
A curious fact is that Vitalik applied to work in another cryptocurrency called Ripple, but could not start working due to visa problems. However, while studying at the University of Waterloo, he realized the shortcomings of Bitcoin, specifically about smart contracts, so he decided to create a more scalable and programmable cryptocurrency, which would be presented to the world under the name of Etherium in 2015.
Currently, Etherium is the second most important cryptocurrency, and the most valuable, after Bitcoin. Additionally, another great source of crypto income for Vitalik is the coins that are given to him by the creators of cryptocurrencies that end up operating under the etherium network.
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chris larsen
The next crypto billionaire on this list is Riple founder Chris Larson.
Chris holds a Bachelor of Science and a Master’s degree from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, which is characterized as a fairly selective business school. He also founded and sold several companies during his more than 30-year career. However, since the birth of cryptocurrencies, he has not taken his eyes off them.
Although Ripple is not a very popular coin among those interested in cryptocurrencies, due to the fact that it does not have an issuance limit, it is a cryptocurrency with a constant presence in the top 10 of the cryptocurrencies with the largest market capitalization.
If you are interested in the crypto world, it is very possible that you are aware of everything that happened between the SEC and Ripple. If you don’t know what happened and are interested in finding out, click here.
Changpeng Zhao
For many, C.hangpeng zHao, better known as CZ, is the richest crypto-millionaire of all.
CZ was born in China but moved to Canada to join her father, who had been exiled. CZ learned to code as a teenager and earned a computer science degree from McGill University in Canada. He later moved to Japan and worked programming software for the TSE, Tokyo Stock Exchange (Tokyo Stock Exchange).
In 2013, a friend told him the following: “CZ, you should convert 10% of your capital to Bitcoin because there is a very low probability that it will go to zero and you will lose that 10%. But it is very probable that the value of Bitcoin is multiplied by 10 and thus you would multiply your capital”. Some time later, when BTC was still quite cheap, CZ decided to sell his apartment in Shanghai and buy Bitcoin.
In 2017, before founding Binance (the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange), CZ worked as a CTO at the Okey Coin exchange. It only took 7 months for Binance to climb positions and occupy the first place. And a few months later, BNB, the Binance cryptocurrency, was born.
40% of the initial BNB supply of 200,000,000 was allocated to the founding team. CZ has stated that he holds most of his wealth in BNB. This suggests that it has been pooling BNB and BTC. And with both cryptocurrencies rising in price, his fortune is quite enviable.
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The Winklevoss Twins
Another position in the ranking of crypto-millionaires is occupied by the Winklesvoss twins.
Tyler and Cameron are wise in every sense of the word. For starters, when they were kids, they taught themselves to code and started a web development company. As teenagers, they learned Latin and Greek and played various musical instruments.
Years later, Tyler and Cameron studied at Harvard and Oxford and competed in the 2008 Olympic Games in the rowing category.
You may have heard them mentioned, since they sued Facebook in 2004 on the grounds that Mark Zuckerberg had stolen part of their code. In 2008 they reached an agreement that meant 20 million dollars in cash and 45 million in shares of Facebook.
In 2013, they decided to buy 1% of the BTC that was in circulation (they said they would not sell until the BTC reached a value of $500,000). And a year later, they decided to create Gemini, a renowned cryptocurrency exchange.
Conclusion.
All crypto millionaires are characterized by having great vision about cryptocurrencies. They all invested when Bitcoin was just getting started. Additionally, they have been people of great preparation.
However, I would like to clarify that it is not too late to enter the crypto world. With this I do not mean that you should invest “blindly” absolutely everything you have; It is simply an invitation for you to start researching and preparing. For many specialists, this is just beginning.
We hope this information motivates you and you can achieve great results 🙂
And remember, if you are really interested in creating your own business, you can read our book “How to create a company while working: Discover how to manage your time, manage your money and motivate yourself while creating a company and working for another” , where you will find all the information you need to found your own company, without having to leave your job.
