Bitcoin 
BTC
+2.05%
broke through the $45,000 mark on Thursday, as on-chain data shows miner selling pressure is beginning to ease off.
According to CryptoQuant, on-chain data shows that the largest U.S. publicly traded bitcoin mining companies have continued to increase their bitcoin holdings. For example, CryptoQuant’s charts show Marathon Digital’s bitcoin holdings have increased steadily over the past few months.
CryptoQuant estimates in real-time the total bitcoin holdings of Marathon Digital. Image: CryptoQuant.
Bitcoin selling pressure eases off
In a weekly report, CryptoQuant said that mining selling pressure has reduced after a period of high sales in November and December of 2023. “Daily selling by miners went from 800+ bitcoin daily in November-December 2023 to below 300 bitcoin daily so far 2024,” it said.
CryptoQuant analysts added that miners are holding on to their reserves despite profits from bitcoin network fees having declined. “Bitcoin miner sell pressure has remained low so far 2024 even after daily fees have collapsed 90% from near record-highs in December. The strong decline in fees is related to lower network activity as a result of less transactions coming from inscriptions and BRC20 token mints,” the report added.
Data from CryptoQuant shows the number of transactions on the bitcoin network has declined from a daily all-time-high of 731,000 in late in December to a current three-month-low of 278,000.
According to The Block’s Data Dashboard, the rewards that miners are paid for producing valid blocks and processing transactions have decreased from a multi-year high in December.
Bitcoin upswings causes spike in liquidations
The price of bitcoin has rallied back above the $45,000 mark with the volatile price action causing the liquidation of over $114 million in leveraged cryptocurrency positions.
The price action caused the liquidation of over $49 million in bitcoin leveraged positions, according to Coinglass data. The majority of the BTC liquidations, a total of around $47 million, were shorts.
The world’s largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization increased by over 4% in the past 24 hours to $45,133 at 9:35 a.m. ET, according to The Block’s Price Page.
The price of bitcoin increased by over 4% in the past 24 hours. Image: The Block.
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