Investors Put Less Money Into Crypto Funds Last Week as Bitcoin Market Stagnated
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Bitcoin Rises 5% as Crypto Whales Moved $1B BTC in One Hour
Activity of crypto whales, a term used to describe holders of massive amounts of digital assets, has hit a fever pitch on Tuesday as deep-pocketed investors move more than $2 billion worth of different cryptocurrencies.
In less than one hour, five anonymous whales just shifted over 18,500 Bitcoin—worth nearly $1.02 billion at current price— to unknown wallets, according to Twitter-based crypto transaction tracker Whale-alert.io.
The distributed ledger monitoring has also reported dozens of giant USDT transactions in the last hour.
One of the largest transactions involved a whale relocating 4,953 BTC worth $266 million from an unknown wallet to a separate wallet of unknown origin. The Twitter handle Whale_Alert also noted another transfer of 3000 bitcoins, worth roughly $161 million, from Bitsamp crypto exchange to an anonymous wallet.
Another transaction shows a big hodler shifting 5486 BTC worth $295 million between two wallets of unknown origins.
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It’s not the first time that multiple transactions of this magnitude have taken place, but such moves are rarely seen in the market. Bitcoin whales have been moving large stacks of their holdings at record levels over the last two months, amid high institutional demand for the crypto assets.
Although it’s impossible to know why the cryptocurrency was moved, it could just be that a cryptocurrency exchange is shuffling its own holdings. Additional speculations include internal transfers between exchange wallets, institutions moving crypto to cold storage, or OTC block trades.
Meanwhile, these huge transactions may have triggered the strong bullish momentum seen in the BTC market today, with bitcoin hitting a two-week high at $54,800. And it’s easy to understand why. As whales accumulate more coins, Bitcoins circulating supply reduces, and this strengthens further bullish rallies in the days ahead.
Continuing its upward rally amid heightened interest from bigger investors, traders are now eyeing the psychological $60,000 per bitcoin level sooner than later.
As a result, the latest gains took the combined value of all the bitcoin tokens in circulation past $1.14 billion as of writing, according to industry website CoinMarketCap.
Bitcoin hits highest level in two weeks as institutions turn to crypto
rallied to a two-week high, with prices hovering near $54,000 as the digital currency rides a wave of investor demand for crypto assets.
The token rose 3.8% to $53,850 in early U.S. trading on Tuesday. While high-flying bets like Tesla Inc. and the ARK Innovation ETF have cratered recently, has steadily climbed on news of more institutional involvement in crypto.
On Monday, NYDIG, a provider of Bitcoin-related financial services, announced that it raised $200 million from investors including Stone Ridge Holdings Group, Morgan Stanley, New York Life, MassMutual and Soros Fund Management. NYDIG said adoption among institutions is accelerating, citing data that insurers have more than $1 billion in Bitcoin-related exposure on its platform.
“Bitcoin and Ethereum bullishness are back as more big-money bets keep flowing into cryptocurrencies,” Edward Moya, senior market analyst at Oanda, wrote in an email. “Institutional interest still seems strong.”
The narrative that longer-term investors such as family offices, insurers and corporate treasurers are adding exposure to tokens is controversial but gaining traction. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. recently said it’s seeing substantial demand from institutions as it works to restart its trading desk.
Technical analysis is also supportive of higher prices, according to a report by Evercore ISI strategist Rich Ross, who said Bitcoin could reach $75,000.
In recent days, oil billionaire Kjell Inge Rokke came out in favor of Bitcoin and Rokke’s Aker ASA is setting up a new business to tap into its potential.
“Bitcoin may still go to zero. But it can also become the core of a new monetary architecture,” Rokke, Norway’s second-richest person with an estimated $5.4 billion net worth, wrote in a shareholder letter. He says it’s not inconceivable that one Bitcoin could one day “be worth millions of dollars.”