The crypto market was shaken by a rare occurrence on Friday, July 4, when a dormant whale—holding Bitcoin mined as far back as 2011—became active again. The Satoshi-era entity ended up moving around 81,000 BTC (worth around $8.8 billion) that had been held for 14 years.
These significant movements, the largest single-day transfer volume of 10+ year-old coins, sparked interesting conversations in the crypto community. A popular on-chain analyst has come forward with their interpretation of this phenomenon, saying that “old Bitcoin still matters”.
Why Does Old Bitcoin Matter?
In a Quicktake post on the CryptoQuant platform, pseudonymous analyst Darkfost provided on-chain context on the significance of dormant BTC addresses waking up and shaking the market. This on-chain analysis is based on UTXO Age Bands %, which segments the total BTC supply based on the last time they were transacted.
To begin their analysis, Darkfost acknowledged that the coins moved on Friday were reportedly mined in 2011 when Bitcoin was valued at below $1. According to the crypto analyst, these movements are a reminder of the market influence of miners due to extremely large BTC reserves.
In their Quicktake post, Darkfost used the UTXO Age Bands % metric to visualize how significant the holdings of these Satoshi-era miners are. According to data from CryptoQuant, the 10+ year age band holds a substantial 17%, the largest percentage of the total BTC supply.
Source: CryptoQuant
The cohort of Bitcoin holders with the second largest portion (15.8%) of the total supply lies within the 6 – 12 month age band. This investor group is followed closely by the 3-5 year age band, with 14.3% of the total BTC supply. “This shift represents the transition from STH to Long LTH and suggests that recent buyers are still holding despite market conditions,” Darkfost explained.
Furthermore, investors in the 7 – 10 year age band also hold a significant portion of the total supply, reflecting the control that long-term holders wield over the largest cryptocurrency market. Ultimately, Darkfost concluded that the movement of old BTC is critical to market dynamics as it can carry macro-level implications.
Bitcoin Price At A Glance
The price of Bitcoin has been relatively steady since the occurrence of these large-scale coin movements, while there has been no indication of selling by the Satoshi-era miner. As of this writing, BTC is valued at $108,135, reflecting no significant change in the past 24 hours.
The price of BTC on the daily timeframe | Source: BTCUSDT chart on TradingView
Featured image from iStock, chart from TradingView
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