Active Bitcoin Addresses Drop by 2 million Year-over-Year

The world’s largest cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, was at the center of the recent crypto price crash, losing nearly 60% of its value year-to-date. However, besides a massive price correction, Bitcoin has also seen a drop in active addresses.

According to data presented by Trading Platforms, the monthly number of active Bitcoin addresses dropped by 2 million year-over-year.

“Bitcoin Tourist” Leaving the Market

The falling number of active Bitcoin addresses shows the so-called “market tourists” are fleeing from Bitcoin, leaving only long-term investors with higher levels of convictions in the market.

According to data from the crypto analytics platform, Glassnode, the number of active addresses has seen a downtrend since November 2021, showing new investors are not interacting with the network.

In October last year, the monthly number of active Bitcoin addresses stood at 18.3 million. Over the next four months, this figure dropped by almost 15% reaching 15.6 million in February. After a short recovery in March and May, the number of active addresses continued falling and slumped to 15.4 million in July, the lowest number in the last year. Although the number of active addresses has risen to 16.3 million since then, this still represents an 11% drop year-over-year.

Statistics show the total number of non-zero addresses increased by 11% year-over-year, rising from 38.3 million in October 2021 to 42.7 million last month. The monthly number of new addresses stood at 12.6 million in October, down from 13.5 million in the same month a year ago.

Bitcoin’s Monthly Trading Volume Up by 35%

After a historically low September, Bitcoin’s trading volume significantly increased last month. The CoinMarketCap data show Bitcoin was the second most-traded crypto in October, with a monthly trading volume of $1.59trn, or 35% more than in September. Also, Bitcoin’s trading volume was three times that of Ethereum and $18bn less than Tether’s, the most-traded crypto last month.

Statistics show the 7.3% price increase in October had driven Bitcoin’s market cap to $398.9bn, almost a $30bn jump in 30-days, still deep below values seen last year. Last week, the combined value of all BTC coins slipped to $390.5bn, way down from $1.16trn in November last year.