Priced in or not? BTC miners and traders prepare for Bitcoin ETF trading

Exchange transaction volume dominance sees new all-time highs as the debate over whether the Bitcoin ETFs are "priced in" continues.

Bitcoin (BTC) failed to break out of its established range on so-called “ETF day,” but traders and miners are busy.

Data from exchanges shows that Jan. 10 saw significant BTC movements both before and after the day’s events.

Exchange frenzy accompanies Bitcoin ETF approval

BTC price targets for the day on which the United States approved its first spot Bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) focused on $48,000.

Bitcoin may have stayed in an area below this, but exchange statistics reveal that behind the scenes, no one was taking any chances.

As noted by Gaah, a contributor to analytics platform CryptoQuant, even Bitcoin miners were insuring themselves against volatility.

“Net inflow of ~10k BTC into miners’ wallets before the official approval of the Bitcoin Spot ETF,” he commented while uploading a chart to X (formerly Twitter).

“Net outflow of ~9.5k BTC in miners’ wallets after the approval just after the last price top.”

That outflow became easily the largest net decrease of 2024 so far, per CryptoQuant, and feeds into an existing downtrend in miners’ BTC balances.

Elsewhere, on-chain analytics firm Glassnode acknowledged frenzied trading activity among exchange users as a whole.

On Jan. 10, it revealed the proportion of transaction volume accounted for by exchanges may have reached a new high — over 78%. On Jan. 9, it had already reached unusually high levels.

“Exchange activity remains significantly elevated with 76.4% of Bitcoin on-chain volume flowing in/out of Exchanges, just shy of the ATH of 77.4%,” Glassnode commented on X.

Bitcoin ETF “priced in?” Not so fast

With price still rangebound, meanwhile, popular commentator British HODL looked to the immediate and longer-term future for bullish signals.

Related: MicroStrategy is already up nearly $1B from Bitcoin in 2024

Jan. 11 will see the start of ETF trading, meaning that associated capital inflows — however large — have not yet started.

“Just because the price has not moved yet does not mean that ‘it was priced in,’” he told X subscribers.

“We can judge priced in, at the halving – if the price stays the same between now and then, I’ll say we were priced in.”

British HODL referred to the April block subsidy halving event due in April, which will cut the “reward” paid to miners per block by 50% to 3.125 BTC. As Cointelegraph reported, some believe that $48,000 may well endure until that time.

This article does not contain investment advice or recommendations. Every investment and trading move involves risk, and readers should conduct their own research when making a decision.