All FAQ is answered here:
http://wiki.dashpay.io/display/DRK/Legacy+FAQ
Was Dash Instamined?
~2mn coins were issued in the first 48 hours due to problems with the difficulty readjustment. That represents approximately 10-15% of the total money supply that will ever be issued.
The majority of these coins were distributed through the market in the following weeks and months at very low price levels* (0.0000x BTC per DRK to 0.000x BTC per DRK) and a lot of them were also absorbed in the April/May 2014 price increase.
[*] Examples of prices and selling action almost two weeks after launch:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=421615.msg4861558#msg4861558
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=421615.msg4889177#msg4889177
[*] Forum member coins101 did a blockchain analysis of Dash distribution as of September 2014:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=778616.0
I read somone who wrote that 50% of the coins in circulation are owned by the devs
No. This is a classic case of spreading FUD (Fear Uncertainty and Doubt) by supporters of other cryptocurrencies who perceive Dash as a threat to the coin they support.
The coin has been well distributed through exchanges since early February 2014 – almost 15-20 days after the coin's launch. One could buy as many cheap DRKs as they wanted, with prices of 0.0000x per DRK or 0.0001x per DRK. This can be verified by historic charts of
c-cex.com and
poloniex.com of early Feb 2014. These two exchanges were the first that adopted DRK. Huge buy orders of 20-30-50k DRKs were being filled by early miners who were dumping their coins for pennies, not really appreciating the coin they had in their possession due to the “abundant” way in which they mined it as people do not really appreciate what they are given in ample quantity.
Miners who “instamined” large quantities never foresaw the huge price increase and as such sold over a million coins at prices from 0.0000x up to 0.002 – with the first large batch being sold after DRK hit the exchanges and the next large batches being sold from February 2014 to April 2014 @ 0.0015 BTC price levels. In fact, many coin holders were complaining* of all the “dumping” by those who held cheap coins from the start that kept the price at artificially low levels for 2 months straight.
The dumping ended, due to tremendous market demand, when a “pump” was initiated by “whale” buyers that swallowed millions of USD (in DRKs), raising the price from 0.0012 to 0.017 within a few weeks.
[*] During this dumping period there were certain individuals who spread FUD about how the coin will never rise in price due to the instaminers dumping continuously. These are typically the same people who are claiming that the 50% instamine distribution affects the coin distribution today. However it is impossible to simultaneously claim that the coins were being dumped and that the 50% instamine holds true today. It's either one or the other. Since the coins were being dumped, the 50% instamine distribution was gradually reduced with each dumping wave. Blockchain analysis indicates a well distributed coin, reflecting the fact that the dumped coins were evenly distributed through the market. Early distribution is not currently an issue as huge buyers have been reshuffling the "rich-list" in their favor, buying millions of dollars in Dash during May 2014. Late distribution through aggressive buying is currently more of a concern than early distribution.
Will the initial distribution affect Dash in the future?
It can bring criticism but other than that, no, as Dash has solid fundamentals which are the basis for its continuous ascent despite FUD and accusations.
The creator of the coin proposed to fix the initial distribution issue by airdroping new coins in order to address criticism and resolve the issue once and for all. The community disagreed and voted down this proposal with most arguing that the distribution is relatively OK by now (April 2014) and that the airdrop would create more problems than it would solve.
Even if there were doubts for the distribution, the late April-May “pump” solved the distribution problem for good, through massive buys that “chewed” enormous waves of “dumping” from prior holders of cheaply acquired coins.
The quick monetary expansion at the start, and the slower rate of expansion later on, actually had a very positive, yet unintended side-effect: It allowed Dash to achieve a very low inflation rate. If every coin was mined at a consistent rate, the rate of issuing new coins would debase the value of existing coins significantly more. Compared to other PoW coins that started around the same period, Dash has the lowest inflation. This allowed it to maintain and increase value when other coins were crashing under the weight of their insatiable demand for new BTCs (that were needed to buy their daily production).
The problem of high inflation in new coins, which tends to suppress their price as supply rises, has now created a new trend where some of the newer coins which are designed, either use a short mining period and Proof of Stake or continue with PoW but with a diminishing mining reward after a few days/weeks/month to reduce the problem of inflation.
....
and so on...
.
