Bitcoin Whales Add 2,000 Wallets in a Year Despite Price Dropping 40%

Bitcoin peaked near $90K in late 2025, crashed to $60K in February, rallied back to $82K, then corrected to $76K.

Written by: Sophia Cruz • Tuesday, May 19, 2026 • 2 min read

• Last updated: Tuesday, May 19, 2026

Quick overview

Wallets holding 100+ BTC have increased by 11.2% over the past year, indicating strong accumulation among large holders despite market volatility.
Traders are experiencing high unrealized profit margins, leading to increased selling pressure and profit-taking as Bitcoin struggles around the 200-day moving average.
US institutional demand appears to be weakening, as indicated by negative Coinbase premiums and significant net outflows from spot ETFs.
Despite bearish market signals, whale wallets continue to grow, suggesting that large investors are either confident in future price movements or are misjudging the market.

Wallets holding 100+ BTC just hit 20,229, up 11.2% from 18,191 a year ago. That’s 2,038 new whale-sized wallets accumulating through a 40% drawdown from cycle highs. Each of those wallets now holds at least $7.7 million in Bitcoin at current prices.

The data from Santiment shows steady accumulation regardless of price action. Bitcoin peaked near $90K in late 2025, crashed to $60K in February, rallied back to $82K, then corrected to $76K. Through all that volatility, whale wallet count climbed smoothly without major dips.

CryptoQuant flagged the correction weeks ago. Their head of research Julio Moreno pointed to high unrealized profits, profit-taking spikes, weak US spot demand, and technical resistance at the 200-day MA around $82.4K. Bitcoin hit that level May 13, got rejected, and dropped to current levels near $76K.

The March 2022 parallel is concerning. Back then, BTC rallied 43% before hitting the 200-day MA, then resumed its downtrend. Current rally from April lows measured 37% before hitting the same resistance. Pattern rhymes but doesn’t guarantee same outcome.

Traders’ unrealized profit margins reached 17.7% on May 5, highest since June 2025. That creates selling pressure. When holders sit on big unrealized gains, distribution risk rises. Daily realized profits spiked to 14.6K BTC on May 4, highest since December. People are locking in gains.

Coinbase premium turned negative in late April and stayed there. That signals US institutional demand weakening as price approached $80K. Spot apparent demand is still negative at -11K BTC, improved from -91K BTC in April but not enough to sustain rallies. Demand growth is concentrated in perpetual futures, not spot accumulation. That’s leveraged speculation, not conviction buying.

If correction continues, CryptoQuant sees primary support near $70K at the Traders’ On-chain Realized Price. That level represents average cost basis for short-term traders and has historically acted as resistance-turned-support during bears.

Despite all that bearish setup, whales aren’t stopping. The 11.2% yearly growth in 100+ BTC wallets shows large holders still accumulating. These are institutions, family offices, high net worth individuals with multi-million dollar positions. They’re not panicking during volatility. They’re adding.

Galaxy Digital got BitLicense approval in New York. Their GalaxyOne Prime NY subsidiary can now offer regulated trading and custody to institutional clients. That’s more infrastructure for big money to enter through compliant channels.

Someone also recovered 5 BTC after 11 years using Claude AI to crack an old encrypted backup. Worth about $398K now. Took 3.5 trillion brute-force password attempts. Shows even lost coins sometimes come back, reducing permanent supply loss fears.

US spot ETF flows hit $649 million in net outflows May 18. Not great. Institutions pulling capital while price struggles. That conflicts with the whale accumulation narrative unless different cohorts are moving opposite directions.

Bitcoin’s trading $76K-$78K now after rejecting 200-day MA. Short-term looks weak. Profit-taking active, US demand soft, technical setup bearish. But whale wallets keep growing through it all. That divergence matters. Either whales are wrong and catching falling knives, or they’re positioning for the next leg while retail panics.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR See More

Sophia Cruz

Financial Writer - Asian & European Desks

Sophia is an experienced writer, reporter and newsdesk member, mostly on the financial sectors. For the past 5 years Sophia has covered a wide variety of topics such as the financial markets, economics, technology, fin-tech and trading. Sophia has been a part of the FX Leaders team since 2017 and works on producing valuable content and information for traders of all levels of experience.