The third quarter of 2022 was a rollercoaster for the price of bitcoin. BTC’s price had fluctuated wildly during this time and ended up hitting lower lows than expected. However, this has not changed investors’ convictions about the cryptocurrency. As the third quarter drew to a close, there had been a massive withdrawal spree from centralized exchanges, which led to more than $600 million in outflows.
Bitcoin Outflows Grow
The last day of September has proven to be an important trading day for bitcoin. Given that it was both the last day of the month and a Friday, meaning the close of the trading week, bitcoin investors seemed to have taken this as a sign to move their BTC off exchanges.
Data shows that on this last day, investors moved 34,723 BTC out of centralized exchanges. This came out to Rond $668.07 million at the time of the withdrawals. It also follows the accumulation trend that has been gaining momentum since mid-September. This happened while the digital asset trended below $20,000, and it is now apparent that this accumulation trend had been behind the brief spike above $20,000 on Friday.
More than 34k BTC leaves exchanges in one day | Source: Santiment
On-chain data aggregator Santiment notes that this is the 4th largest daily BTC outflow that has been recorded for the digital asset in 2022. Additionally, it is also a new 3-month record for the digital asset. Part of a large “bank run” that has seen the BTC held by centralized exchanges drop by more than 60,000 over the weekend.
Can This Trigger A Breakout?
For bitcoin, such large removal of BTC from centralized exchanges is always a bullish indicator. Investors tend to do this when their long-term conviction is high, and they want to safeguard their coins as they hold out for the future since it is common knowledge that “Not your keys, not your coins.”
What this does is remove a substantial supply of bitcoin from the open market, leading to a supply squeeze. Demand has also been on the rise for the digital asset, which means buy pressure is mounting. Santiment also notes in its post that the last time that the digital asset had seen such a massive movement of coins off exchanges, BTC’s price had rallied more than 22% in the next month.
BTC settles above $19,000 | Source: BTCUSD on TradingView.com
Interestingly, October has always been a historically bullish month for BTC and the general crypto market. This means that a rally from this present level could see the price of bitcoin hit $23,000 over the next 4 weeks. However, it is also important to bear in mind that the worst of the bear market is not over. So while a breakout is possible, it will be hard for bitcoin to maintain such high levels, and a downward correction could lead to new lows.
Bitcoin is trading at $19,189 at the time of this writing. This puts it 10% below its 50-day moving average of $21,234. The next significant resistance point lies at $19,900, while the digital asset is seeing mounting support at $19,050.
Featured image from CryptoSlate, chart from TradingView.com
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