According to data provided by on-chain analytics firm Glassnode, Bitcoin’s realized cap has just reached a new all-time high.
At the time of writing, $106.6 billion has been invested in the Bitcoin over the course of its existence.
Bitcoin’s realized cap, explained
Bitcoin’s market capitalization, which simply multiplies Bitcoin’s total supply by the asset’s current price, currently stands at $172 bln.
Instead of assigning the same value to every UTXO, analysts also calculate Bitcoin’s realized cap by recording the latest price at which each coin moved.
Analysts believe the realized cap metric proves a clearer picture of the network’s liquidity since it doesn’t treat all coins uniformly.
For example, it gives significantly less weight to dormant BTC that cannot be accessed due to lost private keys.
Why this is good for the bears
Bitcoin’s realized market cap crossed the $100 bln milestone on Aug. 2019, which was followed by a sharp sell-off that caught traders off guard one month later.
Glassnode points out that the last all-time happened right before ‘Black Thursday’ of May 12 when BTC careened more than 51 percent in 24 hours.
Cryptocurrency analyst Luke Martin says that realized cap at highs ‘hasn’t been good’ to Bitcoin’s price action in a new tweet.