Bitcoin Whales and Ethereum Whales Are Not the Same: Glassnode – Decrypt

This week observers learned a stark contrast among large holders of the market's two main cryptocurrencies, highlighting a seemingly opposite sentiment among whales in Bitcoin and Ethereum. According to on-chain analytics firm Glassnode, Ethereum whales holding 1,000 or more ETH (worth barely $1.5 million) have been on a strong downward trend since 2020, with the sale of $20 million of ETH.

On the other hand, bitcoin the whales have been quietly accumulating. Those holding 1,000 or more BTC (approximately $26.9 million) have remained largely stable over the same period, albeit with a couple of sharp declines, perhaps due to the FTX Collapse or profit taking after a successful bull run in 2021.

The apparent disparity in whale activity led to a flurry of theories shared on social media, with prominent figures in the Bitcoin sector taking the opportunity to take shots at their counterparts in the Ethereum community.

Steven Lubkasaid Bitcoin Financial Services Private Client Services Head Swan, Decipher that his company has seen a large number of high net worth individuals (HNWI) looking to dump their ETH for BTC. He noted, above all, the legal concerns surrounding the industry.

“Ethereum is under regulatory pressure, while Bitcoin is not,” he said..

His voice resonated with Jesse Shrader, CEO and co-founder of Anvila data analysis company for lightning network.

“Bitcoin provides a simple function: better money,” Shrader said. On the other hand, "while Ethereum offers a lot of fascinating complexity, it risks losing its way due to smart contracts and critical changes to the hard fork protocol."

But the Glassnode data and the conclusions drawn seem incomplete.

"Is the graph adjusted correctly for betting?" asks Kunal Goel, senior research analyst at messer. He explained to Decipher that “is transferred to a betting The contract may look like a chain sale, but in reality it is not a sale at all.”

Currently, staking on the Ethereum network requires users to lock (or pledge) 32 ETH in a smart contract to help the blockchain validate transactions. This appears to be driving the supposed decline in holdings of large entities.

Goel added that while the large difference in dollar amounts between large holders does not disqualify the whales from being compared, "the data must be correct."

André Dragosch, head of research at Deutsche Digital Assets (DDA), a crypto asset manager, echoed Goel's views. He called the ETH whale selling drama a “nothing hamburger,” and noted that the percentage of ETH supply in smart contracts has increased “concordantly.”

He highlighted on Twitter that Glassnode does not include Ether tied in smart contracts to the whale supply metric mentioned above. In fact, Dragosch added, the percentage of ETH supply held by the top 1% of addresses has not decreased at all.

The numbers may seem to say one thing at first glance, but they tell a different story: Bitcoin and Ethereum whales remain bullish.