Bitcoin “shrimp” addresses surge to all-time high above 43 million

• Bitcoin “shrimp” wallets, which hold 1 bitcoin recently surged to 43.2 million.
• Bitcoin addresses with 0.01 BTC or less have also hit an all-time high of 32.6 billion.
• Data also shows bitcoin wallets in profit have reached 70% after recent price gains.

Bitcoin price recently reached an eight month high when it rallied to highs above $25,000 last week.

Despite this, the latest market data from asset manager CoinShares shows Bitcoin investment products saw outflows of $25 million, about 78% of the $32 million that exited amid negative sentiment. But a new report shared by crypto exchange Bitfinex indicates that Bitcoin still saw massive growth in terms of the address count with one BTC or lower.

Bitcoin “shrimp” addresses hit 43.2 million

According to data shared in the Bitfinex Alpha report published Monday, 20 February 2023, Bitcoin addresses with less than one bitcoin, or “shrimps”, recently jumped to 43.2 million – the highest the count has hit in the flagship cryptocurrency’s history.

No doubt this has been greatly helped by the massive growth in addresses with 0.01 BTC or less. Per the Bitfinex report, and from on-chain data by analytics platform Glassnode, the number of wallets with balances of 0.01 BTC or under recently hit 32.6 million.

Overall, wallet addresses with non-zero balances are at an all-time high, which Bitfinex researchers say is indicative of “an influx of new investors.” 

As CoinJournal recently covered, shrimps actually increased their buying even as prices fell after the FTX collapse. And it is this increase in the number of non-zero wallets that could have fueled Bitcoin’s recent upside momentum, the Bitfinex team noted in their report.

Is it the start of a new Bitcoin bull market?

Bitcoin has been largely upwards in January and February, with nearly 50% in overall gains year-to-date as of 21 February. In fact, as Glassnode data shows, the number of Bitcoin wallets in profit (7-day moving average) has also just hit a 10-month high.

📈 #Bitcoin $BTC Percent Addresses in Profit (7d MA) just reached a 10-month high of 70.955%

View metric:https://t.co/ik5IkrcQZM pic.twitter.com/E9XGf1M3cT

— glassnode alerts (@glassnodealerts) February 21, 2023

While analysts warn of a potential pullback amid profit booking across crypto, the sentiment is still mostly bullish for BTC in the short term. And the recent growth in shrimp wallet addresses aligns with historical market trends in a bear market.

In this case, bull markets have traditionally been highlighted by wealth distribution, with the entry of new short term holders a metric that helps signal the shift in market direction.

However, as Bitfinex analysts noted in their report, the latest data is only a “snapshot of the current situation.” In short, it is hard to predict where the market goes next at any one given time.