According to recent data from popular analytics provider Glassnode, whales who mined Bitcoin more than 10 years ago are still holding it and are not selling their "digital gold."
A total of $116 billion in Bitcoin has not been sold since 2011
Glassnode has reported that the amount of Bitcoins held in wallets since 2011 has reached an all-time high of 2,000,826.416 BTC.
Those are the years during which Bitcoin was worth less than $92. At press time, this figure totals a staggering 116,377,444,042 USD.
These days, crypto whales are holding on to their BTC. Other holders from earlier times, however, have recently moved $5 million and $280 million in Bitcoin last shifted ten and seven years ago, as covered by U.Today based on the data shared by Whale Alert.
Chances are high, though, that some of these holders have just lost their private keys to the wallets.
Number of wallets holding 10+ BTC hits a new low
Glassnode has also shared that the amount of wallets with 10+ Bitcoins in them ($580,558 at press time) has dropped to a low of 148,000. This is indicative of users purchasing more BTC to use it as a store of value after the U.S. Senate passed a $1.9 trillion stimulus program.
As stated by Galaxy Digital CEO, Mike Novogratz, retail investors have been actively purchasing Bitcoin lately and they managed to push the price of the flagship cryptocurrency to the new all-time high of $61,800 on Saturday.
Institutions are acquiring Bitcoin
Aside from that, institutional investors have been grabbing Bitcoin. Among the latest purchases is one made by MicroStrategy as the leading business software maker put another $15 million worth of BTC on its balance sheet.
Besides, as reported recently, major global bank Morgan Stanley has granted Bitcoin exposure to its wealthiest customers (restricted to only 2.5 percent of their net worth).
Morgan Stanley has gone further, however, and it has made a bid to acquire a stake at the top South Korean crypto exchange, Bithumb.