Market "Discount Season": What Are the Whales Accumulating?

Author: Bitpush Editorial Team

Over the past month, Bitcoin has experienced intense volatility around the $80,000-$90,000 range, while most altcoins have retraced by 15%-40%. However, this has provided a comfortable “private accumulation” window for whales. According to real-time on-chain whale monitoring data tracked by Santiment and others, whales are quietly building positions in the following sectors, with accumulation intensity for some tokens even reaching new highs in 2025.

1. Payments/Cross-Border Settlement: XRP Becomes the Whale Favorite

With the SEC and Ripple settlement finalized, the XRP ETF has shifted from expectation to reality, further stimulating whale accumulation. In the past 30 days, XRP has seen the most dramatic net whale inflows among all altcoins:

• Addresses holding 100 million-1 billion XRP have increased by 970 million XRP
• Addresses holding over 1 billion XRP have increased by 150 million XRP
• Combined, these two address groups saw inflows exceeding $2.4 billion
• Exchange XRP balances continue to decline, hitting a new low since 2023

2. Established Layer 1: ADA Accumulated Against the Trend

Cardano (ADA) saw a rare “whale rotation buy-in” from November 24 to December 4 (12 days):

• The largest wallets (holding over 1 billion ADA) started accumulating on November 24, with a total increase of 130 million ADA so far
• Wallets holding between 10 million and 100 million ADA began accumulating on November 26, adding 150 million ADA
• Both groups saw net increases within days, indicating strong whale confidence even as ADA traded near recent lows
• Whale entry prices are low; if the price breaks above $0.43, it may rise to $0.52. If it falls to $0.38, the bullish outlook weakens, and reversal signals may fail.

3. DeFi Blue Chips: UNI and AAVE Swept Up Simultaneously

UNI: In the past week, whales added about 800,000 UNI (worth nearly $5 million). After the fee switch vote passed, the top 100 addresses collectively hold 8.98 million UNI, showing strong accumulation, while exchange supply continues to decrease.

AAVE: In the past 30 days, whales have added over 50,000 AAVE, bringing total holdings to an all-time high of 3.98 million.

Common points: TVL continues to recover + real revenue (fees) is rising, with whales positioning early.

4. Meme Coins: Overall Pullback, But Some “Low-Price Tickets” Snapped Up by Whales

Main battlegrounds:

FARTCOIN: A single address scooped up 32.43 million coins ($10.7 million) in 24 hours

PIPPIN: Whales moved 40.45 million coins ($7.28 million) in 24 hours

PEPE: Whale holdings increased by 1.36% in the past 30 days, totaling over 10 million coins. In short, both hot money and old money are entering; after liquidity dries up, prices could surge violently at any time.

5. AI + Data Sector: ENA and TIA Most Favored

ENA (Ethena): Whale holdings increased by 2.84% in the past 7 days, with the top 100 addresses adding over 50 million ENA

TIA (Celestia): Exchange supply dropped 5%, staking ratio and TVL both hit all-time highs

The combination of the AI narrative and modular narrative has made this one of the most certain long-term sectors this cycle.

6. Storage Sector: FIL and ICP

Since late November, whale addresses for FIL and ICP have both seen large outflows from exchanges, with active addresses and TVL rebounding in sync. The demand from large AI models for decentralized storage is being realized.

FIL: In the past 30 days, whale holdings increased by over 100,000 coins, worth about $50 million; exchange supply dropped 15%

ICP: On-chain active addresses up 30%, whales moved over 50,000 coins off exchanges; TVL rebounded to $120 million

Summary

Clearly, the current whale strategy is:

Pullbacks are buying windows—the more it drops, the more they buy, with little regard for short-term prices

Priority goes to sectors with “real revenue” or “policy certainty”

Meme coins remain a high-risk, high-reward “lottery zone”

Long-term sectors (AI, modular, storage, privacy) have already been positioned by whales 2-3 quarters in advance

Risk warning: Whale accumulation does not guarantee price increases and may become future selling pressure. Always DYOR, exercise caution, and strictly control your position size.