Although Litecoin has experienced a price decline over the past week, on-chain data shows that whale activity has increased to its highest level in recent weeks.
Litecoin whale transactions have recently surged
Data from on-chain analytics firm Santiment shows that the number of Litecoin whale transactions has recently surged. This indicator measures the total number of transfers in amounts greater than $100,000 that occur on the LTC network. In general, only whales can move such large amounts of money in a single trade, so the value of this indicator is likely to represent the activity of big-money investors.
An increase in the value of the number of transactions for a whale means that the whale is participating in more transfer activities on the blockchain. Such a trend could be a sign that the asset is attracting attention from larger traders. On the other hand, the falling indicator suggests that large corporations may be losing interest in cryptocurrencies as they reduce their trading activity.
Here is a graph shared by Santiment that shows the trends in the number of Litecoin whale transactions over the past few months.
As seen in the graph above, the number of Litecoin whale trades has spiked with the recent decline in asset prices, indicating that volatility is triggering activity from large hands.
At the peak of this surge, the index reached a value of 503. This represents the highest number of whale-sized migrations since December 10th. As for what the spike in the indicator means for LTC, it is difficult to say because the whale trade count only includes data on the absolute number of moves made by whales, and has no bearing on whether buys or sells predominate.
But historical data may provide some hints about what typically tends to happen during spikes in whale activity. “Historically, assets are very likely to reverse during whale surges,” the analytics firm explained. This trend was seen during last month's two whale trading highs, which occurred on December 3rd and December 10th. Both of these coincided with Litecoin price highs.
It remains to be seen whether the recent spike in the index signals further decline or, on the contrary, leads to a bottom.
LTC price
Litecoin soared to a high of $84 last week, but the bullish momentum disappeared and the price started this week with a sharp decline towards the $75 level. However, there was some upside activity the previous day as LTC returned to $78.
