Celsius moves $781M in stETH just as Lido withdrawals open

It appears that embattled crypto lender Celsius is wasting no time in shifting its Ethereum staking tokens from liquid staking platform Lido which has just enabled withdrawals.

On May 15, a transaction was identified on Celsius wallets for 428,015 stETH (Lido staked Ether) to the Lido staked Ethereum wallet. The whopping stash was worth $781 million at the time of transfer which some believe is in preparation for withdrawal.

On-chain data points to Celsius performing a test withdrawal of 0.1 stETH a few hours later.

Celsius stETH transfer –Etherscan.io

According to Bitcoin pioneer and Celsius creditor Simon Dixon, Celsius could be “lining up for staking directly without Lido in the middle.” It could also be loan collateral for Celsius restructuring plans, he added.

Blockchain intelligence firm Arkham Intelligence highlighted that Celsius transferred 40,928 ETH last week to a smart contract called “Figment ETH2 Beacon Depositor 1”. This was then moved to the Ethereum Beacon Chain deposit contract on May 12 according to Etherscan.

Related:Celsius creditors demand transparency on ‘suspicious’ FTX transactions

Lido, which takes a 10% staking commission, enabled withdrawals on May 15 with a protocol upgrade to V2.

“Lido V2 introduces two major components, with the most user-facing aspect being Ethereum withdrawals. This allows Ethereum stakers with Lido to directly unstake ETH through the protocol.”

Lido currently accounts for 29% of all staked Ethereum, or 6.27 million ETH valued at around $11.3 billion.

Meanwhile, there is 54,046 ETH currently in the withdrawal queue and this doesn’t include the Celsius stash yet, according to on-chain analytics firm Nansen.

Magazine: Cryptocurrency trading addiction – What to look out for and how it is treated

All Dutch and English crypto news!

Bitcoin trades above $69K following largest quarterly options expiry in history

Bitcoin remained above the key $69,000 mark following the quarterly expiry event, suggesting that the pre-halving retracement may indeed be over. News Own this piece of crypto...

Crypto traders bet $2.4M on spot Ether ETF approval results

Only 19% of gamblers betting on spot Ether ETF approvals are putting their money on a positive outcome for ETH ETF applicants before May ends. News Own...

Dit wordt Bitcoin waard als de Wyckoff methode klopt

Bitcoin lijkt op het punt te staan om naar nieuwe hoogten te stijgen, met voorspellingen dat de digitale valuta binnenkort de $100.000 kan bereiken. Een...

Arbitrum (ARB) price drop signals opportunity as Algotech (ALGT) raises over $3M in three weeks

Potential rebound signals for Arbitrum (ARB) despite the current 18.54% price drop. Algotech utilizes advanced AI for sophisticated trading strategies. Algotech presale raises $3 million, attracting over...

Beste exchanges

Koop je crypto bij Bitvavo