Key Points
- A dormant Bitcoin whale transfers $536.5 million worth of Bitcoin from a Coinbase cold storage wallet after five years of inactivity.
- Bitcoin retail demand hits a five-month low, according to latest on-chain data.
A Bitcoin whale that has been inactive for five years recently moved 8,000 Bitcoin, equivalent to $536.5 million, from a Coinbase cold storage wallet.
Arkham Intelligence, a blockchain analytics firm, revealed that the Bitcoin address received the 8,000 Bitcoins at block 847,490 on June 11.
Transfer to Binance
The same Bitcoin wallet then transferred all the Bitcoin to a Binance deposit address. Arkham Intelligence noted that there were no test transactions before these large transfers.
The Coinbase cold-storage wallet originally acquired the 8,000 Bitcoins in December 2018, in batches of 200 Bitcoin. When addresses that have been inactive for a long time suddenly become active and transfer funds to exchange deposit addresses, it could indicate potential selling activity.
It’s unclear whether the Bitcoin holder sold their assets. However, the recent transfer saw a significant increase from its acquisition price of $3,750 on December 5, 2018, marking a nearly 1,700% surge.
A report by Chainalysis and Fortune revealed that nearly 1.8 million Bitcoin addresses have remained dormant for over a decade. Excluding Nakamoto’s wallet, these addresses hold approximately $121 billion worth of Bitcoin based on current market prices.
Drop in Bitcoin Retail Demand
On-chain data also shows that the average demand from Bitcoin retail investors has dropped to its lowest point in five months since January. The last time Bitcoin retail demand was this low, Bitcoin price rallied by a strong 75% in the following two months.
Data provided by CryptoQuant author Axel Adler indicates that the average monthly change in demand for Bitcoin among retail investors, defined as those with up to $10,000 in transfer volume, has declined to negative 17% over the past 30 days.
Adler noted a comparable drop to negative 18% in January, which coincided with Bitcoin’s price surge from $40,000 to $70,000. This surge occurred following the approval of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in the United States, ultimately leading to Bitcoin reaching its all-time high of $73,679 in mid-March.
Several factors, such as the upcoming inflation-tracking US Consumer Price Index (CPI), are influencing this shift in Bitcoin demand. For the Bitcoin price to reach new highs, the US CPI must fall under 3.3%.
