On-chain data shows Ethereum investors with a holding time greater than three years have ramped up their selling to levels not seen since 2021.
Seasoned Ethereum Holders Are Increasing Their Distribution
As explained by on-chain analytics firm Glassnode in a new post on X, the 3 to 10 years old Ethereum holders have notably raised their spending recently. These investors belong to a broader group known as the long-term holder (LTH) cohort, which has a holding time cutoff of 155 days.
Statistically, the longer an investor holds onto their coins, the less likely they become to sell them at any point. As such, the LTHs as a whole can be considered diamond hands.
Since the 3 to 10 years old ETH investors would be old even by the standard of the LTHs, they may be assumed to include the most stalwart of HODLers. Given this stature of the cohort, the behavior of its investors may be worth keeping an eye on, for selling from them could be a sign that market conditions have forced even the most seasoned hands into exiting.
One way to track the behavior of the group is through the Spent Volume by Age indicator, which tracks the transactions that the various investor age bands are making on the blockchain. Below is the chart for the metric shared by Glassnode that shows the trend in its 90-day moving average (MA) for Ethereum over the last few years.
The value of the metric appears to have shot up in recent months | Source: Glassnode on X
As displayed in the graph, the Spent Volume by Age has shot up for the investors belonging in the 3 to 10 years holding time bracket since late-August. At present, the 90-day MA is sitting above 45,000 ETH, meaning the veterans of the market are selling tokens worth $139 million every day.
“This marks the highest spending level by seasoned investors since Feb 2021,” noted the analytics firm. Besides the selloff in February, this group also participated in almost the same level of distribution alongside the bull run top in the second half of that year.
As the latest wave of selling has arrived, Ethereum has witnessed bearish momentum. It only remains to be seen whether this decline in the price would lead into another bear market like in late 2021, or if the bull run will regain its footing as in February 2021.
LTH selling isn’t the only bearish factor that ETH has had to deal with recently. As the chart shared by CryptoQuant community analyst Maartunn shows, the Ethereum spot exchange-traded funds (ETFs) have witnessed significant outflows over the past month.
The trend in the spot ETF netflows for Ethereum and Bitcoin | Source: @JA_Maartun on X
From the above chart, it’s apparent that Ethereum spot ETFs are seeing a negative 30-day netflow of $1.21 billion, while Bitcoin has had it even worse with $2.80 billion in net outflows.
ETH Price
At the time of writing, Ethereum is trading around $3,100, down over 4% in the last week.
Looks like the price of the coin has plunged during the past day | Source: ETHUSDT on TradingView
Featured image from Dall-E, Glassnode.com, CryptoQuant.com, chart from TradingView.com
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