The ethereum wallet known as the “FTX Accounts Drainer” has started to offload the ethereum it collected this past week after becoming the 27th largest ether address. On Nov. 19, 2022, the wallet held 250,735 ether, but by 7:44 a.m. (ET) on Nov. 20, the “FTX Accounts Drainer” transferred roughly 50,000 ether out of the wallet. By leveraging Ren’s bitcoin gateway, the entity has been swapping out the ethereum in exchange for bitcoin.
‘FTX Accounts Drainer’ Entity Wants Bitcoin
The wallet known as the “FTX Accounts Drainer” has dropped from the position of 27th largest Ethereum wallet to 37th after unloading approximately 50,000 Ether worth approximately $58.3 million on Sunday, November 20, 2022. A day earlier, Bitcoin.com News reported. The wallet became the 27th largest Ether wallet after consolidating over 250,000 ETH.
Onchain analysis indicates that “FTX Accounts Drainer” has sent the 50,000 ethereum through Ren’s bitcoin gateway, a platform that tokenizes bitcoin (BTC) on the Ethereum blockchain. The “FTX Accounts Drainer’s” identity is currently unknown as some believe it’s a malicious entity, others believe it’s a former FTX executive, and some people believe it may be a white hat hacker.
The entity’s other address, which holds more than 100 ERC20 tokens, has been untouched for a week now and is worth about $189 million. The option to offload via Ren’s bitcoin gateway indicates that the user wishes to receive bitcoin in exchange for ether. The choice to use Ren instead of swapping in WBTC was likely because WBTC is managed by Bitgo.
The Renvm protocol is more decentralized as it can mint tokens that represent non-Ethereum-based cryptocurrencies. While tokenized BTC products like WBTC are popular, RENBTC is a lot less liquid in comparison.
