A crypto whale that went inactive for about eight years just woke up from their slumber to move tens of millions of dollars in Ethereum (ETH).
Data from the blockchain tracking platform Arkham shows that an Ethereum whale loaded up 16,636 ETH worth about $186,840 in 2015 from the Switzerland-based crypto exchange ShapeShift.
The numbers suggest that the entity’s average cost to accumulate the ETH stack is about $11.21.
After hoarding ETH from ShapeShift, the whale sent the Ethereum trove to another address where it was untouched for eight years.
But that changed about a day ago when the deep-pocketed investor abruptly relocated the ETH stack to a Gnosis Safe wallet where it was converted into Wrapped Ethereum (WETH), an ERC-20 token pegged 1:1 to the value of Ethereum.
Arkham’s data shows that the whale unloaded about 788 ETH using the trading platform CoW Protocol to pocket $1.83 million in the stablecoin USDT. At time of writing, the whale still holds 15,848 WETH worth $36.43 million.
The blockchain analytics firm notes that the entity currently holds $38.258 million worth of crypto assets, indicating that the deep-pocketed investor made over 20,300% gains from their initial investment.
The whale’s sudden movement comes as Ethereum struggles to maintain bullish momentum this year. ETH started the year trading at $2,279 before rising to as high as $4,070 in March.
But Ethereum has given up most of its gains since and is trading at $2,290 at time of writing.
Generated Image: Midjourney