James Richardson
A mysterious wallet address, labeled “bc1qq…atjty,” has transferred 20,000 BTC — worth approximately $2.34 billion — to Galaxy Digital, marking a notable onchain event late Monday night.
Data from Nansen shows that the transfers occurred between 9:34 p.m. and 1:28 a.m., across seven separate transactions, with batch sizes ranging from 500 BTC to 4,500 BTC. The final movement of 3,160 BTC fully emptied the wallet.
Whale Identified as 2011 Miner With Recent 80K BTC Moves
According to Onchain Lens, the source wallet is tied to a long-dormant bitcoin whale who recently made headlines by moving over 80,000 BTC after 14 years of inactivity.
“This is the first-ever sell-off recorded in this whale’s transaction history,” the platform shared.
The identity behind the whale has yet to be confirmed. However, Coinbase’s Conor Grogan previously suggested the BTC could belong to a single miner from 2011, while Arkham Intelligence proposed that the activity might have been related to wallet reorganization or upgrades.
Why Sell Now? Market Timing Points to Strategy
The move to offload such a large amount of BTC — especially through a major institutional broker like Galaxy Digital — has sparked speculation about timing and intent.
Bitcoin recently soared to an all-time high above $123,000, fueled by ETF inflows, macro liquidity trends, and anticipation of regulatory clarity in the U.S. The whale’s decision to exit during this peak may signal a calculated effort to capitalize on favorable market momentum.
BTC Pulls Back After Peak, Still Up Significantly
Since reaching its latest high, Bitcoin has retraced slightly, now trading at around $117,600, down 3.14% over the past 24 hours, according to PRIME’s BTC price tracker.
