Traders brace for a potential fall in BTC price as whales moved massive Bitcoin across wallets and turned their longs to short positions in the last 24 hours.
Some rotated their funds to Ethereum after Bitcoin dominance dropped to 61.1%. The setbacks in passing crypto bills in the House of Representatives and tariffs cues also stalled upside momentum in BTC price.
Satoshi-era Whale Moves Over 40K BTC
In an X post on July 17, Lookonchain reported that OG whale, which held 80K BTC once, transferred the remaining 40,192 BTC to a new wallet.
The whale moved BTC valued at $4.77 billion from four different wallets to the ‘bc1qs4’ wallet address.
According to the on-chain platform Bitcoin OG whale will likely sell these BTC to crypto exchanges, similar to the 40,000 BTC selloff to Galaxy Digital earlier this week. At the time of writing, the wallet bc1qs4 still holds 40,192 BTC.
On Tuesday, the whale sold 40,000 BTC worth more than $4.7 billion to Galaxy Digital, for the first time in 14 years. Galaxy Digital deposited these BTC to Bybit and Binance crypto exchanges.
Last time these wallets moved, it triggered a selloff in the crypto market and caused BTC USD price to fall below $116,000 from an ATH of $123,100.
Traders anticipated these BTC transfers and adjusted their positions accordingly as BTC price looked stuck at $118K.
James Wynn Turned Bearish on BTC Price
Some whales also liquidated part of their BTC holdings, moving their funds to Ethereum as the ETHBTC climbed higher.
Lookonchain revealed that high-leverage trader James Wynn closed his 40x long position on Bitcoin. He booked a profit of $368,120, turning back to profit after getting liquidated.
However, he opened a 40x short position on Bitcoin, predicting a fall in BTC price in the coming days.
James Wynn’s BTC short position has a liquidation price of $120,142. In response to the decision on turning bearish, he said, “It’s pretty obvious we’re in altcoin season.”
Bitcoin Could Fall to CME Gap Near USD 115K
Analyst Rekt Capital pointed out a CME gap between $115,625-$114,305. Most traders adjust their positions according to CME gap and Bitcoin price typically fills this gap before continuing its upside momentum.
However, BTC price was finding support just above its daily CME gap, moving mostly sideways. The strong spot Bitcoin ETF inflows and corporate adoption kept market sentiment bullish.
At the time of writing, BTC price dropped more than 0.80% in the last 24 hours. The price was exchanging hands at $118,197 at the time of writing.
Furthermore, the trading volume decreased by more than 10% in the last 24 hours, indicating a decline in interest among traders.
CoinGlass data also showed mixed trading in the derivatives market. At the time of writing, the total BTC futures open interest dropped 2% to $86.88 billion in the last 24 hours.
BTC futures OI on CME jumped more than 1% and slipped more than 2% on Binance. This signals uncertainty among derivatives traders amid tariffs and whales selloff jitters.
