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Decade-Old Bitcoin Mystery Revealed As Dormant Wallet Awakens With $35 Million Transfer, Following A $6 Billion Crypto Shuffle
- Billions of dollars have been moved from wealthy, early Bitcoin adopters as a 12-year-old wallet transfers USD $35M to several new addresses.
- Just a week prior, the world’s fifth-largest BTC wallet liquidated its funds into three different crypto wallets.
- The reason behind the transfers remains a mystery, as the owners of each respective wallet are anonymous.
The crypto world is one that seems to always be shrouded in mystery. I suppose it comes with the territory, given the founder of digital currencies is known exclusively by the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, whose true identity has never been revealed. (You heard me, Craig Wright).
Given that, strange behaviour isn’t exactly strange. A 12-year-old wallet with millions worth of Bitcoin suddenly decides to splinter assets across several different accounts? Seems normal to me!
Whales Awaking From Hefty Slumber
Seeing dormant wallets wake up from years of inactivity is always a good time to feel jealous about early-stage Bitcoin investors (unless, of course, you are one such investor). The wallet in question, which had been untouched for 11.7 years, accumulated 500 BTC in a single transaction way back in July 2012.
The value of 500 BTC back then?
A paltry USD $3,785 (AUD $5,800).
The unknown whale redistributed all of their USD $35M (AUD $54M) worth of BTC holdings across several different wallet addresses. The rationale is still unknown, although it’s possible the wallet owner happened across an old password/seed phrase to regain access to their assets. Or, of course, it could be a deep conspiracy involving aliens and ghosts. It’s hard to say!
What does make things a little…fishier…is that last week a different whale sprung into motion and traded over $6B (AUD $9.24B) worth of BTC to several different wallet addresses. (And yes, we do know that whales aren’t fish).
Prior to the transactions, the wallet was the fifth-largest Bitcoin address in the world.
Author
Ben Knight
Ben Knight is a writer and editor from Melbourne with a passion for all things music and finance. He enjoys turning complex topics – especially the technical details of cryptocurrency – into digestible bites that anybody can understand. He acquired his Master’s in Writing, Editing and Publishing from RMIT in 2019 and has run his own creative writing business ever since.
