After many trials and tribulations – and even a string of bankruptcies – Bitcoin (BTC) miners have been able to catch a break in late 2023 with a significant rally in the price of the world’s foremost cryptocurrency.
The New Year saw a new trend with these companies as they started selling their cryptocurrency en masse. As of January 17, miners have sold a total of 10,600 BTC worth approximately $452 million, per an X post shared by Ali Martinez, a prominent crypto expert.
In fact, Bitcoin miners are currently engaged in active selling, and on-chain data indicates that significant selling pressure persists across the major cryptocurrency exchanges, according to the analytics platform Crypto Quant.
This trend comes as the crypto industry is undergoing several important shifts. Exactly one week ago, on January 10. the SEC announced it had approved a long list of spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETFs) – the first of their kind in the U.S.
The historic decision, while driving volume and boosting investor enthusiasm, also caused a major retracement that saw Bitcoin erase $80 billion from its market cap and the entire crypto market approximately $100 billion in just under a week.
The selloffs also come 11 days after Bitcoin mining difficulty and expenses rose by an estimated 1.78% and less than a hundred days before the halving – an event that will significantly decrease BTC supply and is expected to have a major impact on prices across the board.
Institutions increasingly interested in Bitcoin miners
As it turns out, mining companies have also benefited from significant investments from multiple financial behemoths – including those traditionally critical of, if not even opposed to, Bitcoin – which have been pumping millions into the sector throughout 2023.
BlackRock (NYSE: BLK), the world’s largest asset manager with $9.42 trillion in assets under management (AUM), has been a major shareholder of 4 out of 5 biggest mining firms since at least August 2023 and has only ramped up its involvement with these firms throughout the second half of the year.
Additionally, Vanguard – an investment firm with $7.7 trillion in AUM – has also been pumping money into Bitcoin miners and was, as of January 13, the largest shareholder of both Marathon Digital (NASDAQ: MARA) and Riot Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ: RIOT), despite also reportedly blocking its clients from buying the newly-approved BTC ETFs.
BTC price analysis
Bitcoin itself has been undergoing a price correction since the start of 2024 and has already faced two sharp and significant price declines. The first came on January 3, when it erased $60 billion in a day, and the second shortly after the EFT approval when it – after briefly retesting $49,000 – quickly crashed to approximately $42,000.
Since January 1, Bitcoin is down 3.61%, and the world’s foremost cryptocurrency fell another 0.56% in the last 24 hours, reaching the press-time price of $42,584.
Despite this, Bitcoin has shown some growth in the last 30 days – 2.82% – and a remarkable 52-week price increase of 101.28%. At the time of publication, it decisively retains its top position among cryptocurrencies with a market cap of $834 billion.
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