Thousands of bitcoin tokens — which have only moved twice in the last 11 years — appear to have woken up.
The crypto tracker Arkham Intelligence spotted the change, stating that 49 addresses consolidated into five that now hold a cumulative 49,858 (around $2.12 billion). The last two times the bitcoin moved was in 2019 and 2013.
"$2 billion of dormant Bitcoin moved just before US market open today, across several linked addresses," Arkham wrote on the social media platform X. "Historically these Bitcoins have all moved at the same times and dates."
The movement of the dormant bitcoin comes nearly a week after the approval of 11 spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds on Jan. 10, which began trading on stock exchanges such as Cboe, NYSE and Nasdaq a day later.
Bitcoin was trading at around $42,600, down around 0.9%, at 10:30 a.m. ET on Jan. 17, according to The Block's Price Page for bitcoin.
Price and 24-hour movement for bitcoin. Image: The Block Price Pages
About Author
MK Manoylov has been a reporter for The Block since 2020 — joining just before bitcoin surpassed $20,000 for the first time. Since then, MK has written nearly 1,000 articles for the publication, covering any and all crypto news but with a penchant toward NFT, metaverse, web3 gaming, funding, crime, hack and crypto ecosystem stories. MK holds a graduate degree from New York University's Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program (SHERP) and has also covered health topics for WebMD and Insider. You can follow MK on X @MManoylov and on LinkedIn.