Large investors (whales) are increasingly prioritizing (go long) positions compared to retail investors on Ethereum (ETH) and Cardano (ADA), according to Alphractal's analysis based on the Whale vs Retail Delta index – a measure of net leverage positions between large and small investors.
The positive delta indicates that whales are buying heavily and leaning towards long positions, while negative delta usually reflects distribution, when whales are reducing long positions or opening shorts, even as retail investors continue to buy.
Shark's confidence amid market recovery
The latest observation from Alphractal comes amid a general market recovery. Ethereum, in particular, has seen a notable rebound after briefly dropping below 2,700 USD last week. In the past 24 hours, ETH has risen over 4%, reaching 3,026 USD. However, compared to last month, ETH is still down 26.37% due to ongoing market volatility.
The recovery of Ethereum seems to be driven by strong accumulation from large investors during the “sensitive” market phase. New analysis shows that wallets holding between 10,000 and 100,000 ETH now own a total of over 21 million ETH – a record high never seen since the network's inception.
Moreover, investors holding over 100,000 ETH have also increased their positions, bringing the total amount of ETH held by this group to around 4.3 million, reflecting growing confidence from institutional investors and large liquidity holders. This accumulation coincides with the trend of decreasing supply on exchanges, as ETH reserves on Binance fell to about 3.764 million ETH in November.
Data shows that ETH is being transferred to staking contracts or stored offline. Adding to the positive momentum, Arkham also discovered an extremely liquid “OG Whale” that previously made nearly 200 million USD from short positions, has now invested 10 million USD into current long ETH positions, bringing the total position value to 44.5 million USD.
Meanwhile, crypto analyst Ali Martinez points out potential accumulation zones at $2,250, $1,550, and $1,080, viewing these as strategic support levels for investors looking to get in ahead of the anticipated ETH price surge.
Cardano also recovers after the technical incident
The price of ADA also followed a similar trend after a short-term decline when the blockchain faced a chain split issue due to a malformed transaction triggering an old bug from 2022. The incident occurred because a stake pool operator (SPO) accidentally activated according to AI instructions, causing some nodes to run on different chains. As a result, the blockchain split into two parallel versions, forcing the development team to take urgent action. A quick patch was deployed, restoring network stability.
ADA stabilized shortly thereafter and increased by 4% on Thursday, trading at 0.431 USD at the time of reporting. Despite the short-term recovery, ADA is still down more than 35% over the past month.
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