Wallets associated with the defunct Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox transferred over 140,000 bitcoin (BTC), valued at approximately $9 billion, to an unknown address starting early Tuesday in the Asian morning hours. Mt. Gox, which was once the largest Bitcoin exchange globally, shut down in 2014 after a significant hack resulted in the loss of hundreds of thousands of bitcoins. Since then, creditors have been eagerly awaiting the repayment of their holdings, a process that many believe could impact the BTC market by increasing selling pressure.

In a recent press release, rehabilitation trustee Nobuaki Kobayashi confirmed that no sale of bitcoin or bitcoin cash (BCH) had occurred, emphasizing that these assets were being securely managed. The transaction history reveals that the movements involved thirteen transactions. The sequence began with a likely test transaction worth $3 on May 20, followed by another smaller transaction of $160 early on Tuesday. The subsequent transactions varied in size, ranging from $1.2 million to $2.2 billion worth of bitcoin.

Data from Bitinfocharts shows that all of Mt. Gox’s coins have now been consolidated into a single Bitcoin wallet. This marks the first movement of assets from Mt. Gox’s cold wallets in over five years and appears to be part of a broader plan to distribute these assets back to creditors by October 31, 2024. The new address, identified as “1JbezDVd9VsK9o1Ga9UqLydeuEvhKLAPs6,” has been confirmed by CryptoQuant’s head of research, Julio Moreno.

According to Alex Thorn, head of research at Galaxy, most of the transferred bitcoin is expected to be held by creditors rather than being sold on the open market. This perspective aims to reassure the market that a massive sell-off is unlikely. However, despite these assurances, market participants reacted negatively to the movements, with Bitcoin prices experiencing a decline of 1.4% since the beginning of Asian trading hours. The cryptocurrency’s value dropped to as low as $67,680 after reaching a high of over $70,000 on Monday.

This significant transfer marks a pivotal moment in the long-standing Mt. Gox saga, highlighting ongoing efforts to rectify the fallout from the exchange’s collapse. The anticipation of asset distribution to creditors has been a critical concern for the Bitcoin market, reflecting broader anxieties about the potential impact on Bitcoin’s price stability. As the situation unfolds, market participants will closely monitor any further developments and their implications for the cryptocurrency landscape.