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Ethereum Whales Come Alive: Are They Buying Or Selling?

On-chain data suggests the Ethereum whales have shown a burst of activity recently. Here’s what these titans have been up to.

Ethereum Whale Transactions Are At Their Highest Since March

In a new post on X, the market intelligence platform IntoTheBlock has discussed how the ETH whales have become active recently.

The on-chain metric of interest here is the “Number of Large Transactions,” which, according to the analytics firm, tracks the total number of Ethereum transactions on the network valued at more than $100,000.

Generally, only whale entities can make such large single transaction movements, so such large transfers are associated with these humongous investors.

As such, the Number of Large Transactions indicator can tell us whether this cohort is active right now. The chart below shows the recent trend in this Ethereum metric.

Ethereum Whale Transactions

The graph shows that the Number of large transactions for Ethereum has sharply increased recently. This suggests that the whales have ramped up their activity.

The whales have come alive as news surfaced that the ETH spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) could have improved their approval odds. The hype in the market has meant that ETH has enjoyed a rapid increase, taking its price back around the $3,800 level.

With all this happening in the market, it’s only natural that these humongous entities would be repositioning themselves. As the scale of this cohort’s transactions is quite big, a large number of them taking place together can be powerful enough to cause ripples in the market. Thus, ETH could likely witness volatility shortly if the current high whale activity persists.

However, the direction this volatility might take on Ethereum depends on whether these investors collectively buy or sell. IntoTheBlock data has also provided hints about this, as the below chart for the “Large Holders Netflow” shows.

Ethereum Whale Netflow

This indicator measures the net amount of Ethereum moving into or out of the wallets of “Large Holders.” The analytics firm defines Large Holders as those who own at least 0.1% of the entire circulating asset supply.

The graph shows that the Large Holders have been participating in accumulation recently, as the netflow has been positive for them. Thus, it appears that the recent activity from the whales has involved net-buying.

It remains to be seen if these humongous entities will continue to display this trend in the coming days, potentially helping fuel the rally.

ETH Price

At the time of writing, Ethereum is floating around $3,750, up more than 26% over the past week.

Ethereum Price Chart

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Is Ethereum Doomed? Whales Have Sold 12M ETH In Past Year

On-chain data shows Ethereum whales have sold around 12 million in the cryptocurrency within the past year and have shown no signs of slowing down.

Ethereum Whale Holdings Have Been In Constant Downtrend Since 2020

In a new post on X, analyst James V. Straten has discussed how the Bitcoin and Ethereum whales have shown some stark contrast in their behavior.

Here is the chart that the analyst has shared, which compares the trends in the holdings of these humongous holders for the two assets over their entire history:

Bitcoin Vs Ethereum Whales

For defining what a “whale” is, the analyst has chosen the 1,000 tokens cutoff for both assets. The graph shows that the holdings of the Bitcoin whales have been in an overall uptrend throughout the asset’s history.

Some deviations have been from this upward trajectory, like during the 2021 bull run, where these investors participated in some profit-taking. However, such deviations have only been temporary as the whales have eventually resumed their accumulation.

However, a deviation that is yet to be reversed fully is the drawdown observed around the FTX collapse in November 2022. Nonetheless, the whales have participated in some accumulation since the start of the year; more is needed to retrace the aforementioned plunge.

The Bitcoin whales have seen their holdings move sideways in the past couple of years. The Ethereum whales, on the other hand, have participated in a steep selloff during the same period.

Since 2020, these holders have shed 20 million ETH from their combined holdings, worth about $31.6 billion at the current exchange rate. In the past year alone, they have sold about 12 million ETH ($18.9 billion), an astonishing figure.

As highlighted in the graph, the Ethereum whales showed a temporary deviation phase when they bought at the bear market lows. Nevertheless, this accumulation was quickly reversed as the indicator resumed a sharp plunge soon after.

Something worth noting here is that the size of the whales isn’t the same between the two assets. Due to the difference in the prices of the coins, 1,000 tokens of each have vastly different weightages. Based on this cutoff, Bitcoin whales would hold at least $27.4 million worth of the asset, while the ETH whales hold just $1.58 million.

A more fair comparison may be made by looking at the holdings of the ETH entities of comparable size to the BTC whales. As displayed in the chart below, the Ethereum whales with between 10,000 to 100,000 ETH ($15.8 million to $158 million) have shown accumulation over the years. Still, this cohort has also sold massive amounts this year.

Ethereum Whales

However, the mega whales on the network ($158 million+) have shown behavior more in line with the aggregate 1,000+ ETH group, as they have distributed heavily since 2020.

Ethereum Mega Whales

Ethereum’s situation looks bleak, at least in terms of the holdings of the whales. The fact that these humongous holders have shown no signs of a turnaround so far may be the most concerning, as they lack interest in accumulating the asset. This differs greatly from the sentiment around the Bitcoin whales, who have been participating in net buying this year.

ETH Price

Ethereum has registered some decline recently, as the coin’s price is now retesting the same lows as back in August.

Ethereum Price Chart

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Ethereum Sees Inflows Of $505M Into Binance, Sign Of Selling?

On-chain data shows Ethereum has observed massive inflows of $505 million into Binance during the past day, a sign that selling may be going on.

Ethereum Exchange Inflows Have Shot Up During The Past Day

According to data from the on-chain analytics firm Santiment, this increase in the supply on exchanges is the largest observed since the day before the Merge. The “supply on exchanges” is an indicator that, as its name already implies, measures the percentage of the total Ethereum supply that’s currently sitting in the wallets of all centralized exchanges.

Related Reading: Bitcoin Bearish Signal: Miners Continue To Sell

When the value of this metric increases, it means investors are depositing some coins to exchanges right now. This kind of trend can have bearish consequences for the asset’s price as one of the main reasons why investors transfer their coins to exchanges is for selling-related purposes.

On the other hand, decreasing values of this indicator imply a net amount of ETH is exiting these platforms currently. Such withdrawals can be a sign that the holders are accumulating the cryptocurrency, which can naturally be bullish for the asset’s value in the long term.

Now, here is a chart that shows the trend in the Ethereum supply on exchanges over the last few months:

Ethereum Supply on Exchanges

As displayed in the above graph, the Ethereum supply on exchanges has observed a sharp rise in the past day, meaning that investors have deposited a large amount of ETH to these platforms.

In the chart, there is also the data for another ETH indicator: the “exchange flow balance.” This metric measures the net number of coins that are flowing into or out of exchanges, meaning that the exchange flow balance essentially tracks the changes happening in the supply on exchanges indicator.

During the past day, this metric has seen a large positive value, suggesting that inflows have far surpassed the outflows in this period. According to the metric, around 320,000 ETH ($584.6 million at the current price) has entered into the wallets of the exchanges with this spike.

This net increase in the exchange supply is in fact the largest that the cryptocurrency has seen since September 14, 2022, the day before the transition towards the proof-of-stake consensus mechanism took place.

Interestingly, the vast majority of the inflow spike has been contributed by just one transfer, as data from the cryptocurrency transaction tracker service Whale Alert shows.

This transfer to Binance was worth almost $505 million, and it is one of the largest transactions between an unknown wallet and an exchange observed during the last five years.

It’s uncertain whether the whale has made this deposit with the intention to sell, or for using any other of the services offered by the platform. However, if selling is truly the goal here, then this massive inflow can be bad news for the asset’s price.

ETH Price

At the time of writing, Ethereum is trading around $1,800, up 1% in the last week.

Ethereum Price Chart