Bitcoin Active Addresses Surge to 8-Month High After Coldcard Panic

Bitcoin (BTC) active addresses surged to approximately 0.98 million on July 31, the highest daily count since December 2024, following a wave of wallet sweeps exploiting defective Coldcard firmware. Glassnode published the figure on August 6 and described the spike as “fear-driven on-chain activity,” noting that holders migrating seeds and moving funds to alternative custody reflects an operational security response rather than a change in market conviction.

Coin Metrics recorded 967,546 active addresses that day, 54% above the July average of 627,061. The last higher reading was 985,635 on December 10, 2024. Transaction counts moved in the opposite direction, with 607,581 transactions processed on July 31, below the July average of 656,321.

Exchange balances also climbed. Bitcoin held on exchanges rose from 2,654,863 on July 29 to 2,676,998 on August 3, a net increase of 22,135 coins (0.83%), according to Coin Metrics. The balance eased slightly to 2,667,058 by August 5.

The panic stems from a seed generation flaw in Coldcard hardware wallets. Coinkite, the Canadian firm behind Coldcard, disclosed that seeds created on Mk2 and Mk3 firmware version 4.0.1 (released March 2021) through version 4.1.9 carry weakened randomness. Seeds generated on Mk4, Mk5, and Q devices before patched releases hold about 72 bits of entropy against the intended 128 bits. Patched firmware has been shipped for all affected models.

The first wave of sweeps took 594.5 BTC across 1,324 UTXOs from approximately 500 single-signature addresses on July 30. Median loss per victim was 0.41 BTC, with the largest single loss at 29.9 BTC. Galaxy Research estimates 1,596 BTC has been confirmed stolen from about 7,300 addresses, rising to 2,055 BTC when suspected sweeps are included. The confirmed haul passed $100 million last week.

Santiment measured 0.58 bullish comments for every bearish one across social channels, the lowest positive-to-negative ratio since the firm began tracking. Coinkite has urged all owners who generated a seed on affected firmware to move funds to a new seed on patched hardware. Bitcoin was trading at $64,606 on August 6.

Source: https://cryptopotato.com/bitcoin-active-addresses-surge-to-8-month-high-after-coldcard-panic/