A major Bitcoin investor, infamous for offloading a massive 36,000 BTC in August, has reportedly resumed their selling activity, raising concerns over potential market volatility.
According to blockchain analytics platform Lookonchain, the address associated with the whale transferred 1,176 BTC from two wallets to the Hyperliquid exchange before initiating the sell-off.
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The whale, who had held their Bitcoin with almost no movement for over eight years, shocked the market by liquidating 35,991 BTC—worth approximately $4.04 billion—starting on August 20. Following this massive sale, the investor bought 886,371 Ethereum (ETH) of similar value on the Hyperliquid exchange before going dormant for about two weeks.
Lookonchain noted that this renewed selling activity began as Bitcoin’s price climbed above the $116,000 mark. While the current transfer is just over 1,000 BTC, the investor still holds about 49,000 BTC across four wallets.
Two Scenarios for the Market
This situation presents two key possibilities. If the whale decides that $116,000 is an opportune profit-making price, the selling will likely continue at a larger volume. In this scenario, if new buyers do not emerge, the $116,000 mark could act as a significant resistance level.
The second possibility is that the investor will rotate out of Bitcoin and into ETH or other altcoins, like in August. This could trigger significant price volatility across the market.
Indeed, buying capital, suspected to be for this type of rotation, has already begun to flow into the market since last weekend, particularly into ETH and SOL. Lookonchain says Galaxy Digital alone accumulated over 1.2 million SOL—worth more than $300 million—in a single day.
Bitcoin’s price has rallied since the US CPI report was released last Thursday, recovering the $116,000 level for the first time in two weeks. However, a weekend correction has since brought the price to hover between the $115,000 and $116,000 range. As of this writing, Bitcoin trades at $114,765 on the Binance exchange.
