Share this article

Bitcoin Slumps Below $54K as Mt. Gox Moves $2.6B in BTC

BTC slides to lowest since late February, breaching key price support.

Mt. Gox's wallet activity. (Arkham Intelligence)
Mt. Gox's wallet activity. (Arkham Intelligence)
  • BTC slides to its lowest level since late February, breaching key price support.
  • Early Friday, defunct exchange Mt. Gox moved 47,228 to a new address from cold storage.

Bitcoin's (BTC) slid for a fourth day as defunct exchange Mt. Gox moved sizeable BTC to a new wallet, potentially preparing for creditor repayments.

The leading cryptocurrency by market value fell over 4% to $53,600, the lowest since Feb. 26, according to charting platform TradingView and CoinDesk data.

STORY CONTINUES BELOW
Don't miss another story.Subscribe to the Crypto for Advisors Newsletter today. See all newsletters

At 00:27 UTC, Mt. Gox transferred 47,228 BTC ($2.6 billion) from cold storage to a new wallet, according to blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence. The exchange is slated to start distributing assets stolen from clients in a 2014 hack.

The impending repayments, which include 140,000 BTC ($7.73 billion), 143,000 BCH, and the Japanese yen, were announced last month. Since then, traders have been worried that creditors who have patiently waited for reimbursements for a decade will immediately sell upon receiving coins, creating mass selling pressure in the market. Note that BTC was trading at roughly $600 when the exchange was hacked in 2014, and today, it is worth over $55,000.

Several analysts have recently tried to calm nerves by saying the potential selling pressure from reimbursements would be limited, but to no avail. BTC has declined 10% in seven days and 22% in four weeks.

The intense sell-off has flipped the horizontal support of $56,500 stemming from May lows into resistance. Besides, the bears have established a foothold below the crucial 200-day SMA and the bull market trendline.

BTC's daily chart. (TradingView/CoinDesk)
BTC's daily chart. (TradingView/CoinDesk)
Omkar Godbole

Omkar Godbole is a Co-Managing Editor on CoinDesk's Markets team based in Mumbai, holds a masters degree in Finance and a Chartered Market Technician (CMT) member. Omkar previously worked at FXStreet, writing research on currency markets and as fundamental analyst at currency and commodities desk at Mumbai-based brokerage houses. Omkar holds small amounts of bitcoin, ether, BitTorrent, tron and dot.

Omkar Godbole