Coinbase Quietly Transfers Nearly 800,000 BTC in Massive Consolidation Move

Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has just shuffled about 800,000 BTC (worth about $69.5 billion) into a new wallet, according to on-chain data and social media reports. The company alerted everyone on November 22, noting that the platform would be making an “internal wallet migration.”

Coinbase just moved 4% of all Bitcoins in circulation

Coinbase has opted for a significant migration of approximately 4.01% of the 19,952,526 BTC currently in circulation “from the legacy internal wallet to the new internal wallet.”

This means that your coins were previously stored in a P2PKH (Pay-to-Public-Key-Hash) wallet, but are now relocated to an upgraded P2WPKH (Pay-to-Witness-Public-Key-Hash) address. Btcparser.com spotted the activity, and on-chain analyst Sani, who runs timechainindex.com, also flagged the move.

Coinbase explained in a blog post that it is performing an on-chain funds transfer that involves the transfer of both BTC and ETH. The company stressed that there was nothing prompting the move and that it had been “planned for some time.”

According to statistics from btcparser.com, all addresses with more than 1,000 BTC migrated to the new format have a total of more than 785,000 Bitcoins. Sani from Timechainindex.com analyzed it on X and pointed out that Coinbase transferred 798,636.80107189 BTC between block heights 924641 and 924784.

Sani added that his data shows that 0.31236970 BTC (approximately $26,500) was paid in on-chain fees to miners for the migration. “This represents significant consolidation, reducing the number of outputs held in these addresses by over 97%. This will reduce future transaction fees and streamline wallet management,” Sani explained.

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Naturally, some idiots at Coinbase’s own explanation is a bit questionable, but Sani’s failure has been confirmed. It is also possible that Coinbase moved funds from P2PKH wallets to P2WPKH addresses due to growing concerns about quantum computing.

This theme remained consistent throughout 2025, with growing concerns about quantum threats to older formats such as P2PKH wallets and P2PK (Payments to Public Keys) leading dormant wallets and primary holders to adopt more advanced address types.

Coinbase’s actions stand out because they reflect that large custody providers are aggressively modernizing their internal infrastructure at scale, something few companies can do without disrupting the market. Despite a few stupid X posts trying and failing to stir up drama, the price of Bitcoin remained stable and unperturbed throughout the process.

Frequently asked questions 💡

• What did Coinbase do?Coinbase has migrated nearly 800,000 BTC, roughly 4% of Bitcoin’s circulating supply, to a new internal wallet.
• Why did migration occur?The exchange said the move was a pre-planned internal upgrade and was not caused by external events.
• Has this affected the price of Bitcoin? Despite the misleading chatter about X, the price of Bitcoin remained stable during the transition period.
• Why is this move important?This change highlights the ongoing upgrade to newer, more efficient wallet formats and growing concerns about future-proof security.