Early Ethereum whales stirring? Data shows old Ether is moving

Long-term Ether holders have become increasingly active in the second half of the year as Ether toyed with its all-time highs, with more “ICO-era” holders “awakening” after years of dormancy.

September saw two of the most significant spikes in long-term holder activity since the year’s peak in July, as measured by an analytics platform’s age consumed metric.

The metric measures the total amount of Ether (ETH) changing addresses, multiplied by the time since they last moved. A spike indicates a significant amount of old Ether moving, according to the description.

The metric shows a spike to 502 million, around Sept. 6, and then 603 million at the end of September, the highest in the year outside of July’s high of around 804 million.

September saw two of the most significant spikes in long-term holder Ether activity for the year outside of July.

“ICO-era” Ether holders are waking

The spike in long-term Ether holder activity also includes some of Ether’s early holders.

On Wednesday, a whale that received 20,000 Ether during the Ethereum ICO moved 1,500 tokens to a certain crypto exchange after eight years of inactivity.

When the address first acquired the tokens, the 20,000 Ether cost just over $6,000, but in the years since, it has grown significantly in value to over $78 million.

Two other ICO holders made moves in August and September

Another Ethereum ICO participant who received a total of 1 million in Ether in three installments of 200,000 Ether, 300,000 and 500,000 to three separate wallets during the ecosystem’s genesis days also started making moves in September, moving 150,000 Ether to a new wallet for staking.

The whale spent a total of $310,000 as part of the ICO to receive its Ether, which has since grown in value to over $3.9 billion.

At the same time, a much smaller holder performed their first action in a decade during August, sending 0.001 Ether as a test transaction. Unlike the whales, this holder only bought up 158 Ether in the rollout for $49.