Big Bitcoin Holders Are Selling, But Few Buyers Are Stepping In As Demand Weakens

Bitcoin’s price has struggled to maintain stability above $102,000 in recent days, and data shows this is due to an apparent imbalance between selling pressure and fresh demand. On-chain data from CryptoQuant reveals that while long-term holders have been actively taking profits, the market is showing limited capacity to absorb their ￰0￱ is a contrast to previous phases of the bull run, where rising demand was able to offset increased long-term holder ￰1￱ Reading: XRP’s Price Doesn’t Match Its Growing Real-World Use, Study Finds Rising Long-Term Holder Selling Pressure Mirrors Past Bull Cycles Data from on-chain analytics platform CryptoQuant, which was initially shared by Julio Moreno, head of research at CryptoQuant, shows an interesting change in dynamics among Bitcoin holder activity that could shape the cryptocurrency’s next ￰2￱ Moreno explained that long-term holder (LTH) selling is a normal pattern in bull markets as investors take profits when Bitcoin approaches or surpasses all-time ￰3￱ CryptoQuant data shows that the 30-day sum of LTH spending, represented by the purple line in the chart image below, has been increasing since early ￰4￱ behavior follows previous bullish rally phases, such as those seen in early and late 2024, when profit-taking coincided with expanding demand, and so Bitcoin pushed to new record ￰5￱ chart accompanying Moreno’s post shows green areas representing periods of positive apparent demand growth and red areas indicating ￰6￱ January to March 2024 and November to December 2024, LTH selloffs occurred as demand ￰7￱ Long-term Holder Spending Since October 2025, however, that trend has ￰8￱ as LTH selling increased, demand has entered a red zone, showing that the market’s ability to absorb this selling pressure has ￰9￱ has coincided with Bitcoin’s struggle to sustain its position above $102,000, suggesting that price growth might be losing ￰10￱ Weak Demand Could Delay Next Rally Moreno noted that the critical factor to watch isn’t just the volume of long-term holder sell-offs but whether demand growth can keep ￰11￱ demand is strong, the influx of supply from long-term holders often drives healthy consolidation before another price ￰12￱ contrast, when demand falls behind, the result tends to be prolonged corrections or sideways movement.

A large portion of that demand now comes from Spot Bitcoin ETFs, which have seen a sharp slowdown in ￰13￱ from SosoValue shows that US-based Spot Bitcoin ETFs ended last week with net outflows of $558.44 million on Friday, November 7, one of the largest single-day outflows in ￰14￱ Reading: Get Ready — The End Of November Will Be Massive For XRP, CEO Says Unless Bitcoin’s apparent demand begins to recover in the coming weeks and LTH sell-offs continue, then this might continue to weigh on price action and postpone the next leg of Bitcoin’s ￰15￱ this case, we might continue to see Bitcoin consolidating between $101,000 and $103,000 for the rest of ￰16￱ the time of writing, Bitcoin is trading at $101,655, down by 0.6% in the past 24 ￰17￱ image from Unsplash, chart from TradingView