Chainlink’s non-circulating supply wallet has moved 17,875 million link tokens worth $149 million to Binance. This occurs after today’s scheduled unlock and continues the trend of forwarding unlocked link tokens to exchange.
According to Lookonchain, which reported the transfer, this is the 11th unlock of a token linked to the Oracles platform. Quarterly unlocks involve large-scale relocation of most of the supply to Binance.
Transfers to exchanges represent signs of a possible sale, but frequent chain link transfers may be a way to increase the liquidity of the links in this transaction.
Links will be unlocked for many years (source: LookOnChain)
Interestingly, since August 2022, around 170 million linked tokens have been sent to Binance, accounting for around 80% of unlocked tokens.
At current prices above $12, the Link tokens that have moved to Binance over the past four years are worth more than $2 billion. However, there’s more to come, given that over 300 million linked tokens remain locked and are still scheduled for future releases.
Link struggles despite the history of profits of post unlock
Meanwhile, Link has lost 3% in value over the past 24 hours and continues its struggle to grow year-round. The decline coincides with the unlocked lock, but increased sales pressure and increased circulation supply are not necessarily the reasons why link prices have fallen.
Instead, the decline in links is part of the broader crypto market DIP in the past 24 hours, as tensions are rising amid the ongoing war between Israel and Iran. Bitcoin fell 2% within that period to $103,000, and Altcoins also declined.
Still, Link has been struggling for a while, earning 22.69% in 30 days. Compared to other major cap altcoins such as XRP, ETH and SOL, the links are less performant but showing signs of recovery at $12.62, down more than 40% this year.
Nevertheless, LookonChain noted that most ChainLink unlocks continue to increase in link values. It is still unknown if that will happen again this time.
ChainLink’s potential could raise the price of links
Despite Link’s current struggle, token holders remain bullish on their long-term outlook. They believe it is underestimated because it has a long chance of becoming an important infrastructure for crypto ecosystems.
ChainLink co-founder Sergey Nazarov expressed this sentiment in a recent post, noting that ChainLink is extremely important to Stablecoins. He said that when a genius, stupid bill passes in the US Congress, the country will see a wave of new, stupid things.
According to him, these stupid and stupid things require cross-chain connections and spare proof that chain links provide in one system. Therefore, the increasing complexity of the blockchain ecosystem will lead to ChainLink acting as a critical infrastructure for compliant stability.
One user said:
“ChainLink has already built an entire automated compliance engine with proof of identification, proof of onboarding, verification of certified investors, and sanctions checks before anyone else enters these words.”
Interestingly, his views are consistent with those of others in the community. It captures the evolution of ChainLink from the Oracles provider of the Defi protocol to an interoperability infrastructure provider that connects several blockchain networks.
Meanwhile, ChainLink is reportedly set up to integrate with the Cardano blockchain. Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson said Chainlink leadership has already shown interest in integration, but the delay is due to the project’s business arms having other priorities.
This will continue its obligations and institutional adoption of cradfi. This could continue as the need for cross-chain connections increases and tokenization becomes a reality. Institutions such as Swift, UBS Asset Management and Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM) have already deployed chain linking tools and products.