Someone Just Secretly Dumped $1.3 Billion of Bitcoin – and Nobody Knows Who Did It

On Tuesday May 26, an unknown investor sold 29.2 million shares of BlackRock's Bitcoin ETF in a single private transaction worth $1.3 billion. The trade happened in what is called a dark pool – a private trading platform where big institutions can buy or sell huge amounts of an asset without showing their hand to the rest of the market. Most people have never heard of dark pools, but they are completely legal and extremely common in traditional finance. The key thing to understand is that whoever sold had so much money at stake that using a normal public exchange would have crashed the price on impact. They needed to exit quietly. If you want to understand how regular investors can own Bitcoin without needing to deal with billion-dollar trades, the basics are much simpler than most people think.

Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas confirmed the trade on X just hours after it crossed. He noted that the 29 million share block exceeded IBIT's entire average daily trading volume on its own, making it one of the largest single institutional Bitcoin ETF prints ever recorded. Alex Thorn, head of research at Galaxy Digital, called it the biggest such trade he had ever seen. The identity of the seller remains unknown.

Here is where it gets interesting. Bitcoin dropped from around $77,875 to $76,720 in just 10 minutes after the trade crossed – a 1.5% move on a single transaction. By the end of the trading day it had slid further to $75,600, finishing 2.8% lower. By Wednesday morning, May 28, it had dropped below $73,000. That is a big move – and it did not happen in isolation. US spot Bitcoin ETFs have now recorded eight consecutive days of net outflows. Since May 14, more than $2.26 billion has left these funds. Jane Street cut its Bitcoin ETF holdings by around 70% in the first quarter of 2026. Goldman Sachs trimmed its position by roughly 10%. To put the outflows in context though, over $25 billion flowed into Bitcoin ETFs in the months before this selling streak began – meaning the current exits represent less than 10% of total capital that came in. Investors who want exposure without navigating the current volatility themselves can compare platforms using a guide to the best crypto exchanges available today.

The bigger question is who sold and why. Several analysts suggested the most likely explanation is a hedge fund unwinding a basis trade – a strategy where investors simultaneously hold Bitcoin ETF shares and short Bitcoin futures to collect the difference in price. When that spread narrows, these trades become unprofitable and the positions get closed, which means selling the ETF shares. That kind of mechanical selling has nothing to do with a view on Bitcoin's long-term value – it is just a trade that stopped making money.

The number to watch is $70,000. That is the next major psychological support level below where Bitcoin is trading right now. A close below $73,000 on the daily chart would concern most technical analysts. On the other side, a return to positive ETF inflows – even a single day of net buying – would be the clearest sign that the selling pressure has exhausted itself. The Iran-US tensions driving the broader risk-off mood in markets this week are a separate factor. If geopolitical news improves, crypto tends to recover quickly. If it does not, the macro headwind will remain.