$8B Bitcoin Move by Satoshi-Era Whale Potentially Tied to Security Upgrade, Says Arkham.

$8 Billion Bitcoin Move Tied to Security Upgrade, Not Selling, Says Arkham

A massive $8 billion bitcoin transfer from a long-dormant Satoshi-era wallet appears to be linked to security upgrades rather than any plans to sell, according to on-chain analytics firm Arkham.

Last week, eight wallets—each holding 10,000 BTC since 2011—shifted their funds into new bc1q-style addresses. These modern addresses, known as native SegWit formats, offer improved security, lower transaction fees, and greater efficiency compared to the older legacy addresses starting with “1.”

Arkham, which tracked the transfers, emphasized there’s no evidence that the whale intends to sell the bitcoin. The funds remain untouched in the new wallets, suggesting the move was proactive and part of broader operational security measures instead of a reaction to market conditions.

Meanwhile, Charles Guillemet, CTO of Ledger, highlighted on social platform X that the whale’s old wallets recently received OP_RETURN messages containing legal claims over the coins unless the owner responded by a certain deadline.

Although some feared these messages signaled an attempted hack, Guillemet noted that the sender never demonstrated control over the private keys and had targeted multiple dormant wallets, not just these eight.

“It might be pure coincidence,” Guillemet said on X. “The real owner of the 80,000 BTC saw the OP_RETURN messages and decided to move the funds as a precaution.”

He added that while past compromises of private keys have occurred due to poor cryptographic practices, such as predictable nonce usage or weak random number generators, these issues don’t appear to be relevant in this situation.

OP_RETURN is a feature in Bitcoin that allows users to attach small messages or data to a transaction without affecting the movement of coins.