Hodlers Caused the Q1 Bitcoin Price Decline: Analytics Firm

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When the bitcoin price declined from nearly $20,000 in Dec. 2017 to below $6,000 during the first quarter of 2018, many observers blamed new investors whose shaky hands had never endured a true bear market.

However, new research from blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis suggests that it was long-term investors, hands calloused from years of hodling though they may have been, who triggered the decline and then continued to sell into the dip — to the tune of $30 billion worth of bitcoin between Dec. 2017 and April 2018.

“This was an unprecedented sell off and such an opportunity is unlikely to be repeated soon,” the firm wrote in its report.

According to Chainalysis, those former hodlers largely sold to new speculators — not other long-term investors, shifting the balance of bitcoin wealth away from those with a demonstrated ability to hodl through adversity and toward…