A bitcoin whale that bought nine days before the Covid crash moves $378 million after six years, and nobody knows why

One of bitcoin's great survivors has moved. A wallet labelled "18Vm...VpQ9x" received 4,582 BTC on March 3, 2020, when the stack was worth about $40.8 million, CoinDesk reported, citing Arkham and the public explorer mempool.space. Nine days later the Covid panic cut bitcoin's price by more than 40% to under $4,000. The owner did not flinch, and apart from a tiny test transaction in August 2024 the coins never moved.

On Monday they did. The full 4,582 BTC, worth about $377.6 million, went out to five new addresses, four of them receiving exactly 1,000 BTC and the fifth about 582 BTC, according to CoinDesk. The Block, citing a Lookonchain post built on Arkham data, said the funds were still sitting in those addresses. The holding is now worth roughly nine times what it was in March 2020.

It is not an isolated case. Last week a different wallet, "bc1q...nhj0", moved 4,500 BTC worth $375.7 million after more than four years of inactivity, The Block reported. Both transfers landed while bitcoin was trading in the low $80,000s; CoinDesk puts the implied price of Monday's move at about $82,400 per coin.

What it means is less clear than the numbers. CoinDesk noted that spikes in CryptoQuant's "coin days destroyed" measure, which rises when old coins move, often precede corrections or bursts of volatility, and that long-dormant wallets waking up is usually read as a sign of possible selling. But the same pattern fits a routine security reshuffle between addresses the same owner controls. The purpose of this transfer, CoinDesk said, is unclear. The Block added that QCP Capital's base case for the fourth quarter is bitcoin trading between $80,000 and $90,000.