Glassnode data analyzed by CryptoSlate shows that 450,000 Bitcoin (BTC) held on an exchange or a hot wallet before 2022 have been moved to cold storage throughout the year.
In the past 12 months, the market has seen multiple black swan events that led to around 550,000 BTC leaving exchange reserves. On more than one occasion, these reserves were reduced by large numbers. Binancefor example, lost 90,000 BTC in seven days in December, FTX lost 70,000 BTC in two weeks in June, and eventually coin base lost 200,000 BTC within four days in November.
The orange line in the chart below represents the total amount of BTC held on crypto exchanges since the beginning of the year.
Exchanges started the year with just under $2.8 million in BTC and ended with around $2.25 million, which equates to a drop of around 20%. Current BTC reserves held on exchanges equate to less than 12% of the total BTC supply.
own custody
This year also saw more than a million BTC go into self-custody. The orange line in the chart below shows the level of supply of illiquid BTC, which draws a rising line.
Illiquid BTC supply was recorded at 14 million in January and above 15 million in December. This also indicates that 78% of the circulating BTC supply is held in cold storage.
Considering that only 550,000 BTC left exchanges throughout 2022, it can be said that the remaining 450,000 BTC moved from exchanges or hot wallets to cold storage in 2021 and prior years.
