Bitcoin Accumulation Among Larger Investors Hits Three-Year High

That figure has reached its strongest monthly level since the cryptocurrency collapse that accompanied FTX’s bankruptcy in late 2022, Coindesk reported Sunday (Jan. 18).

In the last 30 days, investors holding between 10 and 1,000 bitcoin, otherwise known as the “Fish-to-Shark” category — have accumulated around 111,000 bitcoin, the report said, citing information from Glassnode. 

That’s the largest increase of its kind since the price of bitcoin plunged to around $15,000 in late 2022, Coindesk added. The Fish-to-Shark cohort, the report said, are high-net worth investors, trading desks, and institutional-sized groups, and now control nearly 6.6 million coins, compared about 6.4 million two months ago.

However, smaller holders, or “Shrimps,” are also bolstering their balances, having accumulated more than 13,000 bitcoin, the biggest increase since late November 2023, bringing this group’s total holdings to roughly 1.4 million coins. 

Both groups, the report contend, seem to be seeing deep value, which could signal widespread demand across the market.

In other crypto news, PYMNTS wrote last week about the trouble lawmakers are having in getting new digital asset legislation passed.

Both the Senate Banking Committee, which oversees the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and the Senate Agriculture Committee, which oversees the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), had set Jan. 15 for a synchronized markup on two variations of a measure regulating crypto markets in the U.S.

But that ended up not happening after both financial services industry groups and crypto groups raised a series of unresolved issues.

“For policymakers, the result represented a classic Washington dynamic: The louder the stakeholder chorus, the more challenging it becomes to discern a policy position,” the report added. “In this case, industry opposition to specific provisions has been enough to stall what observers had hoped would be a landmark piece of policy regulating digital asset markets and building on the momentum of the stablecoin-focused GENIUS Act, which was signed into law over the summer.”

The tension here is not only between crypto firms and regulators; it also reflects long-running friction between the crypto industry and the traditional banking space. Banks have campaigned against crypto offerings that resemble deposit products, particularly stablecoin rewards that, in their minds, compete with regulated interest accounts. 

“This banking pushback has seeped into the legislative text, prompting provisions aimed at limiting crypto incentives, which were a key flashpoint for Coinbase and other developers of stablecoin-based products,” PYMNTS added.