More than 94,500 bitcoins (USD 1 billion) were on the move Friday morning, causing a ruckus on the crypto Twitter. Such a transaction constitutes one of the largest wealth transfers recorded on the Bitcoin blockchain. According to the transaction tracker Whale Alert, the transfer took place at 03:30:05 UTC.
?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? ?? 94,504 #BTC (1,018,147,922 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to unknown wallet
— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) September 6, 2019
Naturally, the Cryptoverse began guessing what does such a transaction mean. On most occasions, large bitcoin transfers are performed by exchanges or other custodial services but in this case, it remains unconfirmed who is the sender or the receiver. More than USD 1 billion transaction cost BTC 0.06534852 (USD 700) in fees.
According to economist and trader Alex Kruger, the bitcoins on the move belong to the largest non-exchange owned address.
Others were quick to guess that it might be clients moving their funds to Bakkt Warehouse, a crypto custody service, before the physically-delivered futures trading begins on September 23rd. Previously, Bakkt announced that its warehouse will start accepting clients deposits precisely on September 6th.
And, of course, some people attributed the transfer to the self-proclaimed Bitcoin creator , who recently was ordered to pay billions in BTC by the court as the judge rejected his testimony.
Whichever the case, it’s unusual to observe such large transactions being conducted in one go. According to the blockchain and smart contracts pioneer , such large transaction doesn’t come without risks. For example, it makes it highly lucrative for the recipient to reverse the transaction, assuming that they can afford to run a 51% attack for more than 40 days. Although such a course of action is highly unlikely, he still calls it “tempting fate.”
Such confidence in Bitcoin is splendid, but a 94,500 BTC tx tempts fate. If recipient can make that much from reversing the tx, they can afford to run a 51% attack for more than 40 days. Big if & very visible, but security here depends more on trust & less on the protocol itself. https://t.co/KQjH8RiAck
— Nick Szabo ?? (@NickSzabo4) September 6, 2019
Meanwhile, other crypto Twitter participants dubbed the transaction “a ballsy move.”
95k just moved in $btc.
WTF.
Talk about balls of steel waiting for that to confirm.
— Compound Profits (@CompoundProfit2) September 6, 2019
How do you move 95k btc without puking while it’s in transit.
— CryptoGainz (@CryptoGainz1) September 6, 2019
How are they even clicking the mouse and hitting keyboard keys with their giant balls...
— pseudozach (@citlayik) September 6, 2019
At pixel time (08:36 UTC), bitcoin trades at c. USD 10,746 and is up by more than 1% in the past 24 hrous and by 12% in the past week.
