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Bitcoin buyers with long-term 'conviction' surges 300% with most recent buyers sitting on profits

Bitcoin held by so-called conviction buyers has surged to nearly 4 million BTC, a roughly 300% increase since late 2025.

By Olivier Acuna|Edited by Jamie CrawleyUpdated May 13, 2026, 4:32 p.m. Published May 13, 2026, 4:00 p.m. 3 min readMake preferred on Long-term bitcoin holders have increased by 300% since the end of 2025 and now hold a total of 4 million BTC worth roughly $320 billion. (Olivier Acuna/CoinDesk)

What to know:

• Bitcoin held by so-called conviction buyers has surged to nearly 4 million BTC, a roughly 300% increase since late 2025, signaling a major shift of supply into long-term, low-activity hands.
• Analysts say this accumulation, led by large holders such as Strategy (MSTR), is tightening liquid supply on exchanges and could set the stage for a future supply shock if demand accelerates.

In a significant shift in bitcoin’s market structure the amount of supply held by “conviction buyers” has surged to nearly 4 million BTC, according to BitGo data cited by Bitfinex on Wednesday.

Bitcoin in long-term buyers’ hands currently represents a 300% increase since the end of 2025, signaling a massive migration of the crypto’s realized value into large, low-activity entities, according to Bitfinex.

The massive “conviction” capital is valued at just over $320 billion, based on bitcoin's current price of roughly $80,000.

“While the exact methodology behind BitGo’s ‘conviction buyers’ metric isn’t immediately clear, the broader signal is notable,” said Mati Greenspan, a market analyst and founder of Quantum Economics. “Historically, periods of tightening liquid supply combined with renewed demand have created the conditions for bitcoin’s most aggressive upside expansions.”

The current accumulation trend marks the largest two-quarter surge in high-conviction buying since the 2020 COVID-19 crash, Bitfinex said. Conviction buyers are long-term investors, whether they be individuals or institutional.

Long-term buyers holdings are not part of the estimated 5.6 million BTC that has been inactive for over a decade, according to Jameson Lopp, a core bitcoin developer. The total amount of bitcoin in circulation is 20.03 million currently, according to CoinDesk data.

Bitfinex analysts noted that a growing share of bitcoin’s realized value is no longer circulating on crypto exchanges, but is instead moving into the hands of entities that rarely transact, regardless of price volatility.

This structural shift suggests that long-term holders, ranging from institutional “whales” to corporate treasures, are aggressively absorbing the available bitcoin supply, most notably Strategy (MSTR), the largest publicly traded corporate holder of bitcoin. This company, which is currently sitting on $4.6 billion in unrealized gains, recently increased its total holdings to 818,869 BTC, which it acquired for nearly $62 billion. When supply moves into these low-activity entities, it effectively reduces the liquid supply available on the open market, creating a potential “supply shock” dynamic.

Supporting this narrative of strengthening the market floor, CEX.IO research. Their analysis reveals that nearly 70% of recent buyers’ supply is now in profit, a metric that often serves as a psychological buffer against sell-offs, according to CEX.IO research.

CEX.IO also suggests that as most new bitcoin investors move into the “green,” their urgency to exit positions during minor pullbacks decreases, which helps stabilize the price of BTC.

"People who actually get bitcoin always want to accumulate as much as possible and never want to sell, particularly now with all the new existing ways to borrow against BTC holdings,” Ran Hammer, vice president of Business Development at Orbs, told CoinDesk. “That changes the supply equation entirely, with more BTC structurally removed from the market.”

In a separate email comment to CoinDesk, Connor Howe, CEO and co-founder at Enso, said he believes BTC's long-term scarcity narrative is maturing from theory into market structure.

“With ETF flows and institutional accumulation becoming more structural than speculative, a larger share of supply is moving into conviction hands,” he said, adding that “this could make future scarcity far more visible when demand accelerates."

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