$10 billion worth of Bitcoin (BTC) was sent from 72 different wallets linked to the defunct crypto exchange Mt. Gox, according to the on-chain intelligence firm Arkham. These transfers come as the exchange prepares to repay its 127,000 creditors.
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Arkham highlighted the series of transactions on X and revealed that the BTC was sent in batches of approximately 2,000 coins. BTC’s price suffered a slight drop throughout the past 24 hours as some investors panic sold their holdings fearing the Mt. Gox coins would be dumped on the market. Although BTC has since recovered slightly, technical indicators warn that the crypto might not be out of the woods just yet.
Mt. Gox Finally Starts to Reach out to Creditors
After not hearing from the exchange for close to a decade, creditors finally started receiving communication from the Gox trustee at the start of this year. According to an Apr. 23 K33 Research note, repayments in the Japanese yen reportedly started to go out towards the end of 2023.
According to Arkham, 141,686 BTC was sent from the wallets to the unlabelled address “1JbezDVd9VsK9o1Ga9UqLydeuEvhKLAPs6” in batches of approximately 2,000 coins. The destination wallet was involved in an earlier test transaction, when the address received $3.65 on May 20.
By the beginning of the day, the wallet address started receiving larger deposits. As of 10:35 a.m. GMT, on-chain data shows that the wallet held just over 137,664 BTC, worth more than $9.4 billion.
$10B of Mt. Gox BTC (140K) moved over the last 7 hours
72 different Mt. Gox-linked wallets sent a total of 141,686 BTC in batches of ~2K to 1Jbez, a new wallet that received its first test transaction for $3.65 on 5/20 last week and began receiving larger transactions 8 hours… pic.twitter.com/PaBXqFrnYO
— Arkham (@ArkhamIntel) May 28, 2024
Mt. Gox was once the largest crypto exchange, accounting for over 70% of all BTC transactions between 2010 and 2014 at its peak. Due to its prominence in the digital asset space, the platform very quickly became a target for cyber criminals.
In February 2014, Mt. Gox had to suspend withdrawals after it identified suspicious activity in its digital wallets. An internal investigation by the team revealed that hundreds of thousands of bitcoins had been “lost.”
Market Spooked by Recent Mt. Gox Transfers
Following the recent activity of the Mt. Gox wallets, the leading cryptocurrency dropped from an intraday high of $69,591.81 to a low of $67,486.65. Traders have since started to buy into the crypto, pushing its price back up to $68,590.
Although BTC managed to recover slightly, it could still be at risk of dropping further in the short term. Both the Moving Average Convergence Divergence (MACD) and the Relative Strength Index (RSI) indicators on BTC’s daily chart warn that bears might start to pull the cryptocurrency’s price down.
A bearish technical flag was triggered by the RSI in the last 24 hours after the RSI line crossed below its Simple Moving Average (SMA) line. Traders usually see this as a sign that bears have gained an upper hand against bulls. As such, sellers could start to exert pressure on the Bitcoin price.
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In addition, the MACD line is collapsing towards the MACD Signal line. A cross between these two lines in the next 24 hours might indicate that BTC has entered a short-term negative cycle.
Renowned analyst Michael van de Poppe shared that BTC is not breaking out after the cryptocurrency was rejected by the $70,000 resistance. He noted, “I’d like $66K to be holding up as support, and then everything is fine,” in a May 28 X post.
Another analyst that goes by the pseudonym Rekt Capital noted in a May 26 X post that BTC was testing a key price zone. Bitcoin attempted to overcome this zone on multiple occasions in March, resulting in “local top structures.” With this current test, Rekt Capital believes that history will repeat itself.
Cryptopolitan reporting by Steven Walgenbach
