This dominance of BTC whales, professional traders in the Bitcoin market cannot be overlooked. They are the most important players to large market movements in the BTC market, such as those levels seen during Bitcoin’s dramatic price decline in March as the COVID-19 pandemic intensified around the world.
“The data shows that the majority of bitcoin is held by those who treat it as digital gold: an asset to be held for the long term.”
“With more people looking to trade bitcoin, which is only becoming scarcer following the recent halving, bitcoin moving from the investment bucket into the trading bucket could become a crucial source of liquidity. However, one would expect this will only happen if bitcoin’s price rises to a level at which long-term investors are willing to sell,” Chainalysis researchers wrote.
Why you should know BTC whales:
In the Bitcoin world, investors or traders who own a large number of Bitcoins are typically called Bitcoin whales. This means a Bitcoin whale would be an individual or business entity (with a single Bitcoin address) owning around 1000 Bitcoins or more.
As BTC whales accumulate BTCs, Bitcoins circulating supply reduces, and this can weaken any bearish trend BTC finds itself in. Meaning that over time, it’s possible that as Bitcoin approaches its fixed supply of 21 million, the price of BTC will go up, with BTC’s present demand factored in.
READ MORE:BTC whales on the rise, as COVID-19 changes Bitcoin’s status quo
Chainalysis a leading crypto analytic firm also explained activities in the BTC market for the month of June. The report said;
“As of June 2020, roughly 18.6 million Bitcoin has been mined. We break that 18.6 million Bitcoin down into three buckets based on its movements to date:
“Roughly 60% of that Bitcoin is held by entities — either people or businesses — that have never sold more than 25% of Bitcoin they’ve ever received, and have often held on to that Bitcoin for many years, which we label as Bitcoin held for long-term investment.
“Another 20% hasn’t moved from its current set of addresses in five years or longer. We consider this lost Bitcoin. That leaves just 3.5 million Bitcoin or 19% of all mined Bitcoin that moves frequently, primarily between exchanges, which we label as Bitcoin used for trading.”
At the time this report was drafted, Bitcoin was still trading below the $9500 support levels, as investors, traders have kept buying BTC at these support levels in the past three weeks.
READ MORE: Forex: U.S dollar falls as U.S Fed gives easier access to cheap money
Recall that Glasscode, a crypto analytic firm recently said, “the price of BTC is now more than 20x higher than it was when we first saw this many whales, implying that more wealth is being held by whales.”
“However, the average balance held by each whale has decreased during this period, such that whales actually hold less BTC now than in 2016, and less wealth (in USD terms) than in 2017,” it added.
It’s also important to note that BTC whales tend to sell their huge stacks of BTC on the BTC market when crypto exchanges are quiet in order to attract attention, the CEO of on-chain analysis provider, CryptoQuant, Ki Young Ju, who had been studying BTC’s trend had said.
On-chain Pattern: The more #BTC networks are used by exchanges, the higher the price tends to rise.https://t.co/rpZjD2OH5I pic.twitter.com/fvx3Z9tyvQ
— Ki Young Ju (@ki_young_ju) June 16, 2020