A prominent crypto analyst has sparked debate in the Bitcoin community by claiming that Bitcoin OGs are losing confidence in the asset as it becomes increasingly adopted by institutions.
“Many of the most ardent early whales have seen their faith shaken and have been selling at these prices,” Scott Melker, aka The Wolf of All Street, said in an X post on Saturday.
There are a “myriad of reasons” to sell Bitcoin
“Bitcoin is amazing, but it’s obviously been co-opted to some degree by the very people that it was created as a hedge against,” Melker said.
While Melker acknowledged that he’s not saying he agrees with them and only “pointing out” what he has been hearing, the comments triggered a debate over what Bitcoin's (BTC) increasing institutional adoption means for Bitcoin’s original ethos.
Alpine Fox founder and managing partner Mike Alfred said he “rarely disagrees” with Melker, but he does on this occasion. “People make a personal decision to sell some of all their coins for a myriad of reasons that have nothing to do with the asset or protocol,” Alfred said.
Several early Bitcoin adopters have publicly disclosed selling off their Bitcoin in recent times. Willy Woo recently told Cointelegraph Magazine he sold most of his Bitcoin because he thinks investing in Bitcoin infrastructure will give him better returns. Meanwhile, prominent Bitcoiner PlanB revealed in February that he sold most of his Bitcoin and switched to spot Bitcoin ETFs for easier management.
Alfred added, “Everyone dies. At some point, investment returns become irrelevant.”
Meanwhile, Bitcoiner Dave Weisberger said that widespread adoption is impossible without institutional interest:
“The irony is that there is NO path to a Bitcoin standard without adoption by the public through the legacy institutions controlling the fiat system AND the distribution of OG held Bitcoin to those entities.”
Bitcoin “is for everyone,” says analyst
Crypto Mags said that Bitcoin doesn’t discriminate. “I’m here to remind you that Bitcoin is for everyone. Everyone INCLUDES enemies, governments, and Wall Street,” Crypto Mags said.
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Bitwise Invest chief investment officer Matt Hougan said while he understands where Melker is coming from, Bitcoin is “still pretty revolutionary.”
“It’s the first global money backed, not by the state and the threat of violence, but by logic and community,” Hougan said.
“Respect to the early whales, and let’s keep building. The world needs Bitcoin more than ever,” he said.
It comes just a day after an early Bitcoin investor sold 80,000 BTC through Galaxy Digital, in what the digital asset company described as one of the largest notional transactions in crypto history.
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