Bitcoin price over $20K creates FOMO with 620K BTC wallets pop-up

Bitcoin (BTC) price surge above $20,000 in the second week of January led to a market FOMO (fear of missing out), especially among small BTC holders with a wallet balance of 0.1 BTC.

There was a significant surge in BTC addresses holding 0.1 BTC or less, after January 13. According to data shared by crypto analytics firm Santiment, 620,000 new BTC addresses have popped up since the January 13 BTC price surge totaling 39.8 million.

The rise in Bitcoin small addresses indicates regrowing investor optimism in 2023. The growth of such small addresses was very limited and slowed down remarkably post-FTX collapse in November, but 2023 has seen the rate

The recent spike in small Bitcoin addresses is the highest since Nov. 2022, a time when the BTC price dipped to its cycle low of around $16,000. The price decline prompted small traders to scoop up BTC at a lower price. The current surge is attributed to a growing bullish sentiment in the market where apart from Bitcoin, a number of altcoins have also recorded multi-month highs, while the overall crypto market surged over 30%.

Related: Bitcoin, Ethereum and select altcoins set to resume rally despite February slump

Bitcoin continued its bullish momentum into February's first week as well, reaching a new five-month high above $24,000. However, the price couldn’t hold above the $24,000 resistance for long and eventually slumped below $23,000 earlier today. Market pundits believe February may not be as bullish as January.

Amid confusion over how incoming U.S. macroeconomic data may affect market sentiment, market analysts have warned that the rebound seen in crypto and stocks this year may flip bearish this month. They attributed the potential upcoming downward trend to the extent of the Federal Reserve’s interest rate hikes.