Crypto bulls turn whale watching into a sport

Bullish markets have turned crypto whale watching into a spectator sport.

Today, a Bitcoin user sent 9,156 BTC ($291 million) between addresses. Four hours later, the price of BTC had dropped up to 13%.

🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 9,156 #BTC (304,080,375 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to unknown wallet

Tx: https://t.co/EPpt5vFdmR

— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) January 4, 2021

While there’s little to suggest the two are related (neither address is flagged as an exchange), the now-steady stream of high value transfers has the imaginations of crypto fans running wild.

[Read more: Bitcoin’s 12th birthday marked by all-time high]

nope he's just shuffling. It might be OTC or going to dump on some shady exchange

— cryptokarma (@KryptoCarma) January 3, 2021

Massive cocaine shipment

— boxcouch ➐ (@BOXCOUCH) January 4, 2021

Other transfers more obviously relate to exchanges. Whale Alert just detected 1,000 BTC sent to Coinbase — a stash worth $31.4 million.

Sending that amount of cryptocurrency to an exchange means the holder wants to either:

• Dump it.
• Store it.
• Trade it.
• Sell it.
• Watch Twitter freak out.

selling at the bottom ???🤣🤣🤣🤣

— Minasmean (@minkyutekken) January 4, 2021

Still, these moves pale in comparison to a transfer from three weeks ago that shuffled 32,353 BTC ($620 million then, $1 billion now) between nondescript wallets — for a $12 fee.