The Largest Investors’ Realized Loss in Bitcoin History Just Happened, But There’s Good News

The bloodbath that brought BTC down from $21,000 to below $18,000 during the weekend has resulted in the largest USD-denominated realized loss for bitcoin investors. Interestingly, long-term holders were among the most active sellers, some of which realized losses in excess of 70%.

Largest USD-Denominated Realized Loss Streak

After registering the longest negative streak in terms of weekly candles in the red a few weeks back, BTC’s ongoing bearish run has another adverse record – this time for investors realizing losses.

According to data from Glassnode, BTC holders “locked” over $7.3 billion in losses from Friday to Sunday, which is now the “largest USD denominated realized loss in bitcoin history.” This came amid the asset’s plunge from $21,000 to an 18-month low of $17,500 in the same timeframe.

The last three consecutive days have been the largest USD denominated Realized Loss in #Bitcoin history.

Over $7.325B in $BTC losses have been locked in by investors spending coins that were accumulated at higher prices.

A thread exploring this in more detail 🧵
1/9 pic.twitter.com/O7DjSK2rEQ

— glassnode (@glassnode) June 19, 2022

The analytics firm informed that around 555,000 BTC had changed hands between $18,000 and $23,000. Somewhat expectedly, short-term holders sold out substantial quantities, with STH-SOPR “reaching levels equivalent to the Nov 2018 bear market capitulation event.”

In fact, such investors realized more losses on only three occasions in the past five years – at the start of the 2018 bear market, the COVID-19-induced crash in March 2020, and from May to July 2021.

What’s perhaps more surprising about the weekend sell-off is the behavior of long-term holders. Glassnode said such investors disposed of 178,000 BTC at prices below $23,000, some of which registered massive 70%+ losses. Their aggregate balance has declined to September 2021 levels since they sold off around 1.31% of their total holdings.

Investigating the profit and loss by Long-Term Holders sending coins to exchanges, we can see a deep capitulation took place.

A few #Bitcoin LTHs even bought the $69k top, and sold the $18k bottom, locking in -75% losses🩸.

Total LTH losses 0.0125% of Market Cap per day.

5/9 pic.twitter.com/bTCvuciUMX

— glassnode (@glassnode) June 19, 2022

But the (Possibly) Good News?

With bitcoin dumping all the way down below $18,000, Glassnode noted that the percentage of the asset’s supply in profit had declined to 49%. Historically, bear markets have bottomed with this percentage dropping to somewhere between 40% and 50%, which could indicate that the bottom could be in for the current correction.

The analytics resource outlined the importance of these levels now and added, “Bitcoin investor conviction is seriously being put to the test” now.

It’s worth noting that BTC has already shown some positive signs, recovering over $3,000 in a day as it currently hovers over $20,000.