16,483,919 XRP Shoveled to Coinbase, Who Stands Behind This Mammoth Move?

Prominent blockchain sleuth Whale Alert, which tracks down large cryptocurrency transfers and then shares the details on its website and X account, has spotted a massive XRP transaction targeted at the largest crypto exchange in the US — Coinbase.

According to Whale Alert, an anonymous crypto wallet shoveled 16 and a half million XRP to this crypto trading platform. This move aligned with the announcement of the interest rate cuts announced by the Federal Reserve earlier today.

Still, a deeper look into the data shared by another blockchain tracker has helped to disclose the anonymous whale that made this hefty transaction.

16,483,919 XRP stun Coinbase, here’s “crypto monster” behind this

According to the aforementioned data source, an anonymous blockchain address transferred an impressive 16,483,919 XRP. This amount of crypto is the equivalent of $50,856,185 in fiat.

In the comments section, a hot discussion was sparked as many XRP enthusiasts on X decided this was a sign of an action incoming and something big looming ahead, perhaps caused by the announcement of the interest rate cuts by Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.

“Whales are getting ready for tomorrow,” one user wrote, while another one commented: “Whale moves usually stir the pot. Time to watch closely.”

Here’s what really happened on Coinbase

However, the XRPscan data has shed light on this “mysterious” transaction. In reality, it turned out to be an internal transfer, as Coinbase moved 16,483,919 XRP from one of its wallets to another.

As reported by U.Today previously, over the past month, the size of Coinbase’s XRP holdings has drastically shrunk — from 52 wallets initially to 6 by now. On-chain XRP tracker @XRPwallets believes that this was caused by the recently inked collaboration between Coinbase and BlackRock’s crypto investment firm Aladdin, which began to provide its institutional customers with crypto exposure this summer.

Overall, this source has named only three crypto exchanges that are holding between one and three billion XRP. They are Binance, Bitthumb and Upbit.