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Bitcoin’s “realized” market capitalization reached an all-time high of $378 billion today, according to data from metrics site Glassnode.
📈 #Bitcoin $BTC Realized Cap just reached an ATH of $378,768,190,450.72
View metric:https://t.co/C8JhD26mC1 pic.twitter.com/ohXnmFDkNk
— glassnode alerts (@glassnodealerts) August 14, 2021
Realized market cap measures the size of Bitcoin’s active market cap. The measurement ignores stashes of Bitcoin that haven’t changed hands for a long time, such as the dormant riches of Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, whales, lost coins or long-time HODLers.
To calculate realized market cap, data metrics platforms like Glassnode assign time-sensitive values to coins. If a coin last moved in 2018, when the price of Bitcoin was $6,000, that coin is priced at $6,000 rather than today’s price.
The standard measurement of market capitalization is a multiplication of all the coins in circulation by the current price of the coin. Bitcoin’s total market cap is $880 billion, according to CoinGecko.
Realized market cap provides a clearer estimation of the size of the “active” Bitcoin market. That Bitcoin’s realized market cap hit its all-time high when Bitcoin’s price is still far from its peak of $64,800 suggests that there’s never been as much “active” money in Bitcoin.
The spike in realized market cap coincides with Bitcoin hitting $48,000, its highest price since the market crash that began in mid-May. Bitcoin has increased by 9.5% this week and 42.5% this month. Shortly after hitting $48,000, Bitcoin fell sharply to $46,700.
Another sign of the hubbub is Bitcoin’s latest mining difficulty adjustment. In its latest fortnightly change, the Bitcoin network made mining 7.3% more difficult yesterday to account for the increased competition among miners.
The adjustment was the second consecutive positive change after two months of drops; the drops followed a crackdown on Bitcoin mining in China, which also cut Bitcoin’s price in half. Today’s all-time high for Bitcoin’s realized market cap shows traders are clawing back their coin.