Hmm that's a hard question, I think that someone is a whale if they at least own crypto's worth of 10k$ or 100k$
You can't buy a new car with $10K. $100K = apartment. Your logic = go to bank, take loan and you are a whale...is wrong. What is your definition of a whale? How many BTCs do you need to have to be a whale?
guess atm many whales don't have BTCs at all lol