Bitcoin Whale Sends Millions to Kraken as Blackrock’s ETF Attempts To Make History

A Bitcoin whale sent 1,519 BTC valued at more than $104 million to the centralized exchange Kraken in the last 24 hours, according to Whale Alert. This transfer follows a series of whale transactions made throughout the past day. 

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BlackRock’s spot Bitcoin ETF (exchange-traded fund) is trending toward all-time high figures in assets under management (AUM). 

Large Bitcoin Transfer Follows Other Transactions by Kraken’s Wallets

Kraken’s wallets had initiated a series of larger transfers before the whale Bitcoin transaction that saw 1,519 BTC deposited on Kraken. These earlier transfers involved BTC amounts ranging between 4,206 and 4,999 units, which were sent from the exchange platform to unknown wallets.

The first of these transactions was the smallest. During this transfer, 4,206 BTC, worth more than $288 million, was sent from a wallet linked to Kraken to an unlabeled wallet. 

🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 4,206 #BTC (288,222,083 USD) transferred from #Kraken to unknown wallethttps://t.co/TWfbEndVP1

— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) May 30, 2024

Thereafter, five more transfers of 4,999 BTC each were initiated from Kraken-owned wallets, according to Whale Alert.

The exchange’s wallets also initiated massive transactions for smaller-capped cryptos in the last 24 hours. Tron (TRX), Ethereum (ETH), and the remittance token Ripple (XRP) were also withdrawn from the platform in large batches.

56,969 ETH worth around $212,030,717 was sent to an unknown wallet. Similarly, 217,726,210 TRX valued at $30,360,140 and 262,575,885 XRP totaling $137,276,075 made its way out of the exchange’s wallets and into unidentified addresses.

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These substantial transfers could just be Kraken shifting their holdings to cold wallets for security reasons. It is also possible that these transactions were part of a portfolio rebalancing procedure by either a single whale or a group of large investors. 

Either way, the transfer of these cryptocurrencies off Kraken could be seen as a bullish sign. This is because it lowers the amount of digital assets available for sale on the exchange, subsequently reducing sell-side pressure on these cryptos.

BlackRock’s ETF May Reach $20 Billion AUM in Under 1,000 Days

While funds leave Kraken’s wallets, investors continue to pour money into BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT). On May 29, the fund recorded inflows of $24.5 million. Fidelity’s FBTC recorded inflows as well, with approximately $18 million making its way into the fund.

IBIT currently holds just over 289,035 BTC. This is after it overtook the converted Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) to become the largest spot Bitcoin ETF.

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Since these investment products launched at the beginning of the year, IBIT has consistently led the charge in terms of inflows. As a result, IBIT’s assets under management (AUM) have topped $19 billion. Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas commented on IBIT’s remarkable performance in comparison to that of the JPMorgan Equity Premium Income ETF (JEPI). In a May 29 X post, he said:

“More context on just how absurd $IBIT is, there’s only been one ETF in history to reach $20b in assets in under 1000 days. $JEPI, which did it in 985 days. $IBIT is a hair away at 137 days.“

ETF Store president Nate Geraci also shared his take on IBIT’s impressive streak. Now that IBIT has surpassed GBTC, he thinks the next fund that IBIT might look to overtake will be the iShares Gold ETF.

After passing GBTC, think next milestone to watch for iShares Bitcoin ETF is tracking down the iShares Gold ETF…

IAU launched in 2005 & has nearly $29bil.

Would be something if IBIT caught it before year-end. Currently at nearly $20bil.

— Nate Geraci (@NateGeraci) May 29, 2024

On-chain data shows that IBIT added another 364 BTC to its holdings over the past 24 hours. Meanwhile, GBTC’s outflows persisted with another 1,550 BTC leaving its reserves. Overall, 9 ETFs decreased their collective holdings by 667 BTC, which is worth around 45.5 million.

Cryptopolitan reporting by Steven Walgenbach

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