Bitcoin whale moved $1 billion, but who was it?

The move happened just as bitcoin was going through another rally, battling out the $8,700 resistance level. Blockchain analysis discovered the transfer happened between cold wallets belonging to the Bitfinex exchange.

Big fund transfers usually cluster around significant bitcoin price moves. Bitfinex remains one of the biggest BTC holders, despite the diminished influence of the exchange. Whale transactions of this size usually happen once every few months, with large-scale transfers noted twice in 2019.

But the size of this transaction is still relatively small to last December’s feat, when $8.9 billion in value were moved within three bitcoin blocks. BTC transactions remain relatively unchanged at around 300,000 per day, but value size varies, as whales may prepare for trading activity, or simply switch hot wallets.

Whales prepare to sway bitcoin prices?

In the past few days, mid-range transactions to and from exchanges once again caused speculation on whether the whales also intended to perform trading moves.

The recent whale activity also caused mild congestion, as more funds were moved to Coinbase, leading to increased trading load. The Bitcoin rich list shows that beyond exchanges, coin ownership has created various sizes of large-scale stashes. Wallets with 1,000 BTC have grown, as well as stashes above 10,000 BTC, and BTC is more democratic in comparison to altcoins and tokens.