A stunning rally in the crypto market attracted crypto whales that came as no surprise. These large holders of crypto assets have enough power to set the market astir. With staggering bets, crypto whales disturb waters where small fish or retail investors swim in. Over a few recent months, small investors have been piling up their wallets with digital assets. However, as a rule, retail investors incur losses when a whale moves a large quantity of bitcoins at once, for example selling it.

Glassnode, a crypto analytics firm, reported that bitcoin whales holding from 1,000 to 10,000 BTC decided to sell these assets at their historic highs. In February alone, they sold over 140,000 bitcoins at a total value of $6.82 billion. Retail investors followed suit. This massive selling dragged down prices of other digital currencies, thus causing a crash in the whole market. Bitcoin slumped nearly 20% to $45,000 per token.     

Crypto sharks are another group of investors who possess from 100 to 1,000 BTC, so they are in between crypto whales and small fish. In January 2021, they sold over 95,000 tokens. In February, on the contrary they bought 117,000 bitcoins. Analysts at Glassnode identify another category of crypto investors. There are also octopuses whose wallets contain from 10 to 100 coins. These market participants have been betting against bitcoin since November 2020. This category of crypto investors has earned $6.14 billion, having sold over 128,000 tokens for more than 4 months.

Interestingly, these groups of crypto investors follow distinctly different strategies. Rakesh Jhunjhunwala, the billionaire investor known as India’s Warren Buffet, expresses strong aversion to crypto speculations. He warned that the hangover from the bitcoin mania would be worse than the party itself. Besides, the famous business magnate said that once the bitcoin party was over, its participants could end up having a severe headache. "I will never buy bitcoin in my life," he summed up.