A colossal sum of 35,000 Ethereum (ETH) tokens has just been sent to the world’s oldest cryptocurrency exchange, Bitstamp, according to a report by Whale Alert.
Digging deeper into the details of the massive deposit, it turns out that $88.3 million worth of ETH tokens were sent to Bitstamp hot wallet “0xf79” from the address “0xee47” in just one transfer. Whale Report identifies the sender as an unknown entity, but data from Arkham Intelligence alleges that WisdomTree may be behind the transfer.
WisdomTree is one of the largest players in the ETF and fund market, both as a sponsor and as an asset manager. As of 2024, the company reportedly has about $100 billion in assets under management, and of course some of that is allocated to Ethereum, with several altcoin-based investment products being launched by WisdomTree.
🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 35,000 #ETH (88,596,083 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to #Bitstamphttps://t.co/xSlDmAuzTw
— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) October 25, 2024
Is WisdomTree behind it?
According to Arkham, the firm holds over $1 billion in digital assets, with 16,504 ETH in particular, which equates to about $41.89 million. But that is only the known addresses, as there are several other wallets that may belong to the investment firm, but it is not known for sure.
If “0xee47” does belong to WisdomTree, it could be a worrying sign, considering it is twice as much as the company has on confirmed addresses. Conventional crypto wisdom has it that such massive transfers to exchanges are a precursor to a major sale.
The fact of the transfer alone may create a vulnerability, but if it is confirmed that WisdomTree is getting rid of its Ethereum holdings, that would be a whole other story.
