Satoshi-Era Bitcoin Wallet Awakens After 14 Years, Moves 150 BTC Worth $16.56 Million

A wallet dating back to the Satoshi Nakamoto era of Bitcoin has come to life after 14 years of inactivity. The address is believed to have mined around 4,000 BTC, worth $445.42 million at press time, between April and June 2009 – just months after the blockchain first went live.

According to data from the on-chain analytics platform Nansen, the wallet’s unidentified owner has made their first transfer since June 2011, moving out 150 BTC ($16.56 million) in a single transaction on Thursday.

Bitcoin OG Whale Wallet Holding 3,958 BTC Activates for the First Time Since 2011, Transfers 150 BTC to Another Address

The Bitcoin block explorer platform Memepool Space suggested that the whale may have once held 7,850 coins and was last active when it consolidated 3,968 BTC into a single address in 2011. It has remained untouched ever since. Those bitcoins, worth just $67,724 fourteen years ago, are valued at roughly $442 million at the current market rate.

In 2010, when the market began tracking Bitcoin prices for the first time, the whale’s total stash was worth just $194. Transfers made from Satoshi-era wallets are far and few, with Glassnode data suggesting that only a handful of pre-2011 Bitcoin addresses move funds each year.

These coins were mined when Bitcoin’s pseudonymous founder, Satoshi Nakamoto, was still involved in online discussions and actively working on the network.

Blockchain analyst Emmett Gallic noted that the whale once held 8,000 BTC across multiple wallets and has been steadily moving holdings to another address with the intention of selling “for years.”

Satoshi-Era Bitcoin Transfers Tend to Trigger Short-Term Volatility, but Experts Suggest that Most Cases are Strategic Repositioning Rather than Liquidations

Old wallet activations typically trigger short-term volatility in the market, as traders interpret these moves as early miners or adopters preparing to sell their bitcoins, sparking fears of large exchange inflows. However, in most cases, these coins are not sold but rather transferred to newer addresses for security, inheritance, or consolidation purposes.

In July, another original Bitcoin whale, who held 80,201 BTC ($8.91 billion) and had been dormant since 2011, sent their stockpile to an address owned by crypto asset manager Galaxy Digital.

At the time, crypto analyst Willy Woo stated that whales with more than 10,000 BTC ($1.11 billion) have been steadily selling their holdings since 2017. However, OG Bitcoiners cashing out assets are not concerning because newer whales are jumping at the opportunity to claim them, absorbing the sell pressure. This is also a sign of a healthy and maturing market.

Unless the latest transfers are traced to exchange-linked addresses, there is no way of telling that the coins were sold off. When similar OG wallet awakenings occurred in 2021 and 2023, they failed to trigger dramatic price drops for Bitcoin. Those transactions were traced to strategic reorganizations rather than liquidations.

Bitcoin Under Pressure as U.S. CPI Releases

Macroeconomic tension and heightened risk-aversion narrative have piled pressure on Bitcoin’s price in recent weeks. The apex crypto has been consolidating between $108,000 and $111,000, with traders on the lookout for signals amid fears of further corrections. In such an environment, movements made by Satoshi-era wallets trigger “Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt” (FUD), but they are also a reminder of the immense fortune that awaits them. While such awakenings hold psychological weight on investors, they don’t pose a risk unless the coins hit exchanges.

BTC defended its critical support level at $105,971 and broke above its 20-day EMA ($109,384), signaling short-term bullishness. However, the MACD histogram turning negative at -556.94 reflects lingering bearish divergence. The outcome of Friday’s U.S. Consumer Price Index (CPI) print is pivotal, as a favorable sentiment regarding the CPI could trigger fresh inflows into spot Bitcoin ETFs and validate its role as an inflationary hedge. Conversely, hotter sentiments towards the CPI print might stall momentum and increase profit-taking risks. Bitcoin’s next resistance is near the $113,000 mark.

At the time of writing, Bitcoin (BTC) is trading at $111,275.42, dip of 15.91% in 24 hours.

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