US Govt Could Be World’s Largest BTC Reserve Owing to Seizures from Silk Road, Bitfinex Hack

Presently, Bitcoin is trading at the price point of $28,363 (roughly Rs. 23.6 lakh).

Written by Radhika Parashar, Edited by Siddharth Suvarna | Updated: 17 October 2023 14:33 IST

US Govt Could Be World’s Largest BTC Reserve Owing to Seizures from Silk Road, Bitfinex Hack

Photo Credit: Unsplash/ Ewan Kennedy

The US government often auctions portions of its BTC holdings on government orders

Highlights

US law enforcement agencies bust crypto crimes that brings in BTC to gove
US government could have at least 194,188 BTC tokens in possession
These tokens were confiscated from criminals

Bitcoin holdings in the US Treasury has risen exponentially in recent years, making the US government reportedly the largest BTC reserves in the world. Owing to three big seizures from criminal cases, the US Treasury is estimated to be in possession of at least 194,188 BTC tokens. Presently, with Bitcoin trading at the price point of $28,363 (roughly Rs. 23.6 lakh), the US treasury could be holding BTC worth $5.5 billion (roughly Rs. 45,778 crore).

In the last three years, the US law enforcement agencies managed to bust three crypto-related crimes and recovered crypto in bulk. These cases include the Silk Road darknet debacle, seizure of Silk Road-related stolen BTC from American national James Zhong, and the Bitfinex hack hassle.

In an analysis, crypto firm 21.co has reportedly said that the 194,188 BTC token projected to be with the US government – could be a lower-bound estimation solely based on publicly available information. In reality, the holdings could be even larger.

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US government among largest #Bitcoin hodlers with over $5B in BTC:
The $5-billion estimation is based on three major seizures linked to the @bitfinex hack and Silk Road, meaning the actual holdings could be much larger. pic.twitter.com/DXqH9ueILS
— Phan Nghia MMO (@phannghiammo) October 17, 2023

The Marshals Service in the US gets to take the responsibility of selling seized property. It cannot give the government possession of seized assets immediately. Instead, the Marshals Service first needs to get a definitive forfeiture judgment from the court before handing over the assets to the government.

After regular intervals, the US courts order asset liquation, after which the government sells some portion of their BCT holdings through an auction.

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The crypto culture in the US is growing, which also leads to criminal activities around these assets rising exponentially. The US SEC has been keeping an eagle's eye over crypto firms, including Coinbase and Binance. The US government has been taking strict measures to ensure that crypto-related businesses go through rigorous documentation before blowing up on their operations. It also expects crypto businesses to identify suspicious activities and report them to the law enforcement authorities so that timely action could be attempted.

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Further reading: Cryptocurrency, US, BTC Reserve, Bitfinex Hack, Silk Road

Radhika Parashar

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Radhika Parashar is a senior correspondent for Gadgets 360. She has been reporting on tech and telecom for the last three years now and will be focussing on writing about all things crypto. Besides this, she is a major sitcom nerd and often replies in Chandler Bing and Michael Scott references. For tips or queries you could reach out to her at RadhikaP@ndtv.com. More