BIS Study Reveals Bitcoin Transfer Estimates Can Vary by a Factor of Six
A new study from the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) has found that estimates of Bitcoin onchain transfer values can vary by a factor of six, raising questions about the accuracy of data infrastructure in the multi-trillion-dollar crypto market.
The researchers analyzed approximately 100 billion blockchain records across Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Tron, and concluded that onchain indicators should be treated as rough approximations rather than precise economic metrics.
At the heart of the measurement issue is something called unspent transaction outputs (UTXOs), which can fundamentally alter the picture of economic activity depending on how they are handled. The BIS researchers found that different approaches to handling UTXOs can make Bitcoin's apparent transfer volume swing by a factor of six.
The study also identified approximately 13 million active contracts on Ethereum, including around 1.4 million tokens, and noted that sorting meaningful economic activity from automated contract interactions, bot traffic, and circular flows within the ecosystem is non-trivial.