Key Takeaways
- Justin Sun unstaked another 5,000 ETH on Sept. 8, lifting his Lido redemptions to 10,000 since Aug. 26.
- About $12.3 million in ether moved to Poloniex at roughly $2,481, a venue Sun himself backs.
- Some 238,000 stETH worth $594 million stays onchain, leaving the bigger position untouched for now.
The Trail Since Aug. 26
Onchain analysts flagged the latest step on Tuesday: a wallet cluster attributed to Sun requested the unstaking of another 5,000 ETH from Lido, the largest liquid staking protocol on Ethereum. That takes his redemptions to 10,000 ETH since Aug. 26.
Liquid staking lets holders lock ether with a protocol, collect yield, and hold a tradable receipt token (stETH, in Lido’s case) rather than run validator hardware themselves. Unstaking reverses the trade, turning stETH back into ether that can be moved, sold, or redeployed elsewhere.
Sun has been working through it in steps rather than one clean exit given that a wallet tied to him unlocked 5,000 ETH worth about $12.3 million in the first days of September, a redemption that left his identifiable ether position above 243,000 ETH and, on public trackers, ahead of the Ethereum Foundation.
Where the $12.3 Million Landed
Sun moved $12.3 million of previously redeemed ether into Poloniex across two deposits, at a price near $2,481. It bears mentioning that the exchange is not a neutral venue in this story, as Sun is a majority backer of both Poloniex and HTX, so ether arriving there is not automatic evidence of a sale.
Deposits into a venue the depositor controls are among the weakest sell signals analysts track, even though onchain they look identical to the strongest ones. What can, however, be said is that the ether is liquid and is sitting somewhere it could be sold quickly (even though it has stopped earning staking yield).
The $594 Million That Hasn’t Moved
Sun still holds roughly 238,000 stETH worth about $594 million, his second-largest onchain asset. Ten thousand ETH redeemed over roughly two weeks is a low single-digit slice of the remaining stack.
Ether is currently changing hands near $2,484, moving firmly inside the $2,400 to $2,550 band it has held for weeks. That consolidation has played out while the wider market waits on U.S. inflation data, with bitcoin’s price stalling below $80,000 through the same stretch.
Lastly, Sun’s attention has been spread across a widening set of fronts this year:
If his redemption rate stays near this pace, the 238,000 stETH stack becomes a slow-burning story. If the queue suddenly fills, it becomes a much louder one.
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