BIS Study Reveals Sixfold Variability in Measuring Onchain Transfer Value

A new study by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) highlights the complexity and nuances of measuring onchain transfer value in cryptocurrencies. The research, titled 'Hidden by Complexity? Measuring Stablecoin, Crypto, and Decentralized Finance Ecosystems,' was published in September 2026 and examines data from Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Tron.

The study used a dataset from Mercurius, a project operated by De Nederlandsche Bank and developed with the BIS Innovation Hub and Deutsche Bundesbank. The dataset contains approximately 100 billion records, but the authors caution that this figure represents data points stored through its processing system and should not be read as 100 billion distinct blockchain events.

For Bitcoin analysis, researchers tested three methods of calculating transfer value due to the UTXO (unspent transaction output) model's ability to return unused funds to the sender as change. The upper estimate counts the value of all outputs, while an adjusted measure removes outputs sent back to the sending address, treated as likely change. A conservative lower estimate removes identified self-transfers or subtracts the transaction's largest output under the assumption that smaller outputs represent the economic transfer.

The different methods produced gaps of up to sixfold in monthly estimates of Bitcoin onchain transfer value. The study also found that self-transfer exclusions became more pronounced from March 2016 as address reuse increased.