It was built around the principles of decentralized transaction verification, accessibility and distributed transaction verification. Ironically, a new study finds that after more than 12 years in existence the Bitcoin is fairly centralized – which means too few individuals hold too many Bitcoin.

The National Bureau of Economic Research found that 1% of 19 million Bitcoins in circulation are owned by top Bitcoin users. According to the study, 5,000,000 bitcoins were held by top bitcoin account holders. This is equivalent to approximately $232 billion.

“This measurement of concentration most likely is an understatement since we cannot rule out that some of the largest addresses are controlled by the same entity,” researchers Igor Makarov and Antoinette Schoar wrote.

Further, the research by the NBER also noted that the concentration of Bitcoin miners – those individuals who decrypt complex codes to validate blockchain transactions and “unlock” new Bitcoin – is even more consolidated. Around 50% of Bitcoin mining power is held by miners who are in the top 10%.

“Our results suggest that despite the significant attention that Bitcoin has received over the last few years, the Bitcoin ecosystem is still dominated by large and concentrated players, be it large miners, Bitcoin holders or exchanges,” the researchers wrote. “This inherent concentration makes Bitcoin susceptible to systemic risk and also implies that the majority of the gains from further adoption are likely to fall disproportionately to a small set of participants.”

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