Bitcoin lost more than 70% of its value on a year-on-year basis, when in December, 2017, it was trading for almost $20,000 per coin. The current price of the “people’s currency” is around $3,600.
And while the price seems to be plunging even further, there are some notable events that caused the huge volatility.
According to Bitcoin News, several Bitcoin “whales” have been active, moving large amounts of BTC this week. For example, one of the dormant wallets that has been inactive since 2013, has just moved some $245 million worth of Bitcoin to some unknown address.
Interestingly enough, after this move, some of the richest addresses “moved” as well. The estimated total amount of recently moved Bitcoin is around $730 million, all moved by the top 20 BTC wallets.
One of the main concerns nowadays is the actual role of these “giants” who basically can move the BTC market in an instant. Some speculate that they are selling some of their digital coins to scare the masses and once the price is down, buy cheaper and “feed” their otherwise dormant addresses. Many are wondering what will happen if Satoshi, the creator of Bitcoin, moves or sells his BTC, estimated at around 1m coins.
While other digital coins have been moving recently, one of the largest “whale moves” is the shift of the massive amount of 608,000 Bitcoins from a single wallet. The value of that many Bitcoins is almost $2.4 billion. According to Bitcoin News, the move was made in the span of five days, and the coins were distributed to more than 75 different cryptocurrency wallets.
Such huge “whale” moves are a big part of the drop in Bitcoin’s price. The uneven distribution of the circulating coins and the rapid movement of Bitcoin undeniably affects the price and the recent “bloodbath” of the “people’s currency”.