Fidelity forecasts 42% of Bitcoin supply will be illiquid by 2032

Nearly half of all Bitcoin in circulation could become unavailable on the open market within the next decade, according to a new forecast by asset management giant Fidelity.

The firm’s research analysis released Monday predicts that Bitcoin’s illiquid supply will go up to 8.3 million coins by the second quarter of 2032, which is around 42% of the 21 million total Bitcoin supply.

Fidelity defined “illiquid” Bitcoin as holdings that have consistently increased over time and show little evidence of entering circulation. The analysis listed two cohorts that have met these criteria, including wallets holding coins untouched for at least seven years and public companies with large Bitcoin treasuries.

BTC’s pseudonymous creator, Satoshi Nakamoto, is believed to have mined more than 1.1 million Bitcoin in the network’s early days. If untouched, that amount now surpasses the number of coins yet to be mined, which is 1,081,225.0, and places the value of Nakamoto’s holdings at $127.4 billion at current prices.

Bitcoin illiquid supply has grown for over a decade

According to Fidelity, the first cohort, or long-term BTC holders’ share of Bitcoin that has not moved in seven years or more, has increased every single quarter since 2016. The investment firm places these coins with the dimmest chance of reappearing in active trading.

The second cohort is publicly traded companies with at least 1,000 BTC on their balance sheets. Fidelity explained that this group has experienced only one quarter of net outflows since 2020. 

Publicly traded companies now collectively control over 969,000 Bitcoin, which is about 4.61% of the total supply, and 97% of all publicly held Bitcoin, per data from Bitbo.

As reported by Cryptopolitan yesterday, Michael Saylor-led Business intelligence company Strategy (previously MicroStrategy) added 525 BTC in the past week and is the largest corporate Bitcoin holder in the world with 638,985 coins ($73.4 billion estimated value).

Just 30 companies account for the majority of publicly held BTC, consolidating control among a small set of institutions. Fidelity’s analysis forecasts that together these groups will control more than six million Bitcoin by the end of 2025, or 28% of the total supply that will ever be mined.

By mid-2025, Bitcoin’s circulating supply stood at 19.8 million coins, and the corporate cohort hasn’t stopped adding coins to their treasuries. 

“Of that, we estimate that nearly 42%, or over 8.3 million Bitcoin, will be considered illiquid by Q2 2032,” Fidelity research analyst Zack Wainwright wrote.

The asset manager reiterated that this projection is based on future acquisitions by corporations within the current pattern, meaning actual illiquid supply could go up or slump if institutions change their accumulation rates.

Long-term holders mull bull season

Fidelity’s theory of long-term holders keeping their holdings in “cold storages” is debatable, considering what other analysts who watch the sell-hold cycle of long-term holders more closely are saying.

Michael Nadeau, founder of The DeFi Report, observed that long-term holders are once again releasing coins back into circulation in Q3 2025, a much similar trend to other previous bull markets.

In a post on X, Nadeau noted that during the 2021 market cycle, long-term holders reduced their share of BTC by 13.5% between November 2020 and March 2021, selling into the “true” top in April 2021. Afterward, they began to reaccumulate, ending that cycle with more coins than they had at the start.

Bitcoin long-term holders are distributing tokens back into the market for the 3rd time this cycle.

What's more interesting is what we can learn from the initial distribution phase in each cycle and how that impacted price action at the *end of the cycle.*

In the '21 cycle, LT… pic.twitter.com/99pWYCG4zK

— Michael Nadeau | The DeFi Report (@JustDeauIt) September 15, 2025

According to Nadeau, sharing several charts from Glassnode on X late Monday, long-term holders have now reduced their holdings by 12.4% leading into the first-quarter peak of 2025, suggesting that the “first true top was in Q1.”

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