Market Reacts as Mt. Gox Moves $2.2B in Bitcoin to Unmarked Address

Bitcoin’s value plunged below $69,000 after Mt. Gox moved 32,371 BTC ($2.2 billion) to an unmarked address on Monday. The recent transfer of the defunct crypto exchange is the largest seen in months. 

Data from blockchain analytics firm Arkham Intelligence reveals that Mt. Gox moved the Bitcoin to two distinct addresses. The defunct exchange shuffled most of the assets (30,371 BTC) to the wallet address “1FG2Cv.” 

Furthermore, Mt. Gox transferred the remaining 2,000 BTC ($135.5 million) to its cold wallet, “1JbezD.” At the time of writing, the Bitcoin stash had been shifted to another unmarked wallet address, “15gNRV.”

Debt Repayment? 

It bears mentioning that Monday’s transaction is Mt. Gox’s third on-chain activity in the past five days. On November 1, the exchange transferred 500 BTC to an unmarked wallet address after shuffling 527 BTC to its cold wallet a day earlier. 

Meanwhile, the reason behind the fund shuffle remains unknown, but the general consensus believes Mt. Gox moved the funds in preparation for its subsequent customer reimbursements. Notably, Mt. Gox’s trustee, Nobuaki Kobayashi, noted in October that the defunct exchange had extended its repayment deadline for creditors by a year. 

One of the reasons behind the mixed feelings among the crypto community is that Mt. Gox usually conducts client repayment by moving funds to centralized exchanges such as Kraken and Bitstamp. However, the Monday transfer involved moving Bitcoin worth $2.2 billion to an unidentified address.

Market Reaction 

Mt. Gox’s repayment is considered to trigger selling FUD in the Bitcoin market, as funds are unlocked to early investors who will be on substantial gains. The recent move aggravated Bitcoin’s bearish momentum, fostering a further downward trend in the past 24 hours.

The recent Mt. Gox transfer catalyzed a Bitcoin dump from above $69,000 in the early hours of Monday to below $67,000, representing over a 3% decline. Bitcoin was trading at $68,796 at press time, up less than 1% in the past 24 hours. 

Meanwhile, altcoins also had their fair share of the price action following the Mt. Gox transfer. Ethereum plunged below $2,350, shedding about 4.7%, while Binance Coin (BNB) and Solana (SOL) slipped 3.19% and 4.6%, respectively.