Bitcoin hodling activity resembles previous market bottoms: Glassnode

The majority of Bitcoin has been “hodled” for at least three months in behavior bearing a striking resemblance to previous Bitcoin market bottoms, says blockchain analytics firm Glassnode.

In a July 16 tweet, Glassnode noted that more than 80% of the total U.S. dollar (USD)-denominated wealth invested in Bitcoin has not been touched for at least three months.

This signifies that the “majority of BTC coin supply is dormant” and that hodlers are “increasingly unwilling to spend at lower prices,” said the firm.

— glassnode (@glassnode) July 16, 2022

Bitcoin’s price is $21,013 at the time of writing, down almost 70% from its all-time high of $69,044 in November 2021. The current price puts around 45% of Bitcoin holders with an on-paper loss, according to crypto intelligence firm IntoTheBlock.

According to the Glassnode chart, other times that saw similar levels of Bitcoin hodling were during the end of the bear markets of 2012, 2015, and 2018.

Last week, Coinbase’s head of institutional research, David Duong, wrote in a July 12 report titled “The Elusive Bottom” that on-chain data suggests that recent BTC selling has been carried out “almost exclusively” by short-term speculators. Long-term BTC holders “have not been selling into the market weakness,” he added.

“These holders own a highly concentrated ~77% of the total supply, which is down slightly from 80% to start the year but still quite high,” he explained before adding:

“We see this is a positive sentiment indicator as we believe these holders are less likely to sell BTC during turbulent periods.”

Earlier in the month, Glassnode analysts noted that the Bitcoin market had seen an almost complete purge of “tourists,” noting that activity on the network is at levels concurrent with the deepest part of the bear market in 2018 and 2019.

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Glassnode revealed that the number of active addresses and entities had seen a downtrend since November 2021, implying new and existing investors alike are not interacting with the network.

Additionally, the number of non-zero BTC addresses has reached an all-time high of 42,530,652, according to the firm.