Medha Singh, Lisa Pauline Mattackal

(Reuters] – A growing number of bitcoin investors, who are long-term, is increasing the size of their Bitcoin stashes in anticipation of a cryptocurrency crash in December 2022.

Some experts in the industry point out that the stability of long-term investments is a good indicator of the volatility and potential for cryptocurrency.

Digital currency brokerage Genesis Trading reports that bitcoin holdings in digital wallets have been increasing steadily since last July.

Additionally, bitcoins in “illiquid” wallets are increasing in value, meaning that less coins can be traded. This is based on data from several exchanges.

Noelle Acheson from Genesis Trading, Head of Market Insights, stated that “the number of bitcoins which have not moved for over a year” has increased since July. That’s quite remarkable.

Many investors still went diving in December to escape the crashing cryptocurrency. It was almost the same amount as the second most-popular coin, and the risk appetite of the U.S. Federal Reserve and inflation worries exacerbated by faster interest rate increases.

Although bitcoin and ether posted increases last week, up 2.9% and 6.3% respectively to $43,107, respectively, they still have a ways to go before reaching their 2021 highs at $69,000 and $48,868.

‘STRONG HANDS’

Many experts in crypto warn that bitcoin’s wild swings are impossible to forecast. For example, in 2017, it fluctuated between $1,000 and $20,000. The price dropped to $4,000 just once in early 2020 before it began a remarkable rise.

But bitcoin advocates and others argue that the growing acceptance of cryptocurrency in mainstream finance and investment in the last few years has helped to strengthen the sector.

Delphi Digital, an cryptocurrency research company, stated that its research had shown a similar shift toward bitcoin being held longer by investors. It said this “illustrates the transference of shorter-term weakness to long term strength.”

Crypto data platform Coinglass’s bitcoin Fear & Greed index, has wavered between 10 and 29 since the start of the year, which could be an indicator of a possible market bottom and buying opportunities, according to Will Hamilton, head of trading & research at Trovio Capital Management.

He added that the previous market bottoms of July 2021, March 2020 were correlated with Fear & Greed scores 19 and 10, respectively.

Uninitiated: 0 is extreme fear and 100 is extreme greed.

MUSK AND DOGE

Last week, however, headlines were packed with more information about cryptocurrency.

After Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk posted that they would accept the cryptocurrency as payment for certain merchandise, the attention shifted to Meme-based Dogecoin.

Tweet sent dogecoin nearly up to 12%

Acheson added that more people would like to purchase Tesla merchandise with Dogecoin and this could boost fundamental factors of dogecoin.

The Bank of America (NYSE;) analysts said that cryptocurrency, another altcoin under discussion, could be able to take market share away ethereum. They also suggested that the Solana Blockchain “could become Visa (NYSE.) of digital asset ecosystem”.

Other than that, Bitcoin miners have reacted to the mining restrictions in China, as well as the unrest in Kazakhstan which has been a major hub for bitcoin mining.

According to Glassnode, the mean “hash rate”, which measures the strength of bitcoin’s computing network, reached an all-time high of more than 215 million Terahashes per Second on Thursday.