The United States Missed A $1,7 Billion Opportunity In A Hasty Sell-Off

While central banks around the world are considering, or аrе in the process of issuing native digital currencies, large countries like the United States reportedly missed a golden opportunity to cash-out on seized Bitcoin (BTC). According to cryptocurrency enthusiast James Lopp, the U.S. government auctioned the total amount of Bitcoin for an average price of $818 per BTC.

If the U.S. Marshals held the 185,230 BTC that they obtained through asset confiscation, their current value would have been $1,85 billion. The U.S. Marshal office even announced a closed bid auction for 4,041.58424932 Bitcoin, seized from 56 cases. The largest amount of seized BTC form the U.S. authorities is roughly 535 coins, currently evaluated at over $5,27 million. The entry fee for the auction is set for $200,000 with the total amount of BTC is going to be split into four blocks – 2,500 BTC, 1,000 BTC, 500, BTC, as well as the remaining 41.58424932 coins. The auction is scheduled for February 18th, the announcement from the U.S. Marshals reads.

The United Kingdom is also taking steps for auctioning their crypto holdings. U.K.’s police auctioned Bitcoin, as well as Ethereum (ETH), Ripple (XRP), and Bitcoin S.V. (BSV) and raised close to $370,000 from 62 lots of cryptocurrencies in late September 2019. However, the British police made a better, over market sales price, as the bidding price for 1 BTC reached $8,365, while the market price per Bitcoin was $8,012 on September 27th, when the settlement happened.

Most of the crypto stash belonged to self-proclaimed “full-time crypto trader” Elliot Gunton. He was found guilty of providing illicitly acquired personal data, as well as hacking services in exchange for cryptos. Gunton was also charged with a $491,000 fine for his activities. The hacker was behind the TalkTalk hacker attack, which led to the leakage of personal banking data for over 4,500 users. Also, U.S. authorities pressed charges against Gunton for the 2017 EtherDelta exchange hack. The hacker changed the DNS servers of the landing page of the crypto exchange, leading customers to a cloned website.

In the meantime, Eastern European countries are looking further into the ways to hold and sell seized cryptocurrencies. Bulgaria, for example, is rumored to have at least 200,000 BTC in possession, which would estimate a little less than $2 billion. However, local investigation journal portal Bivol managed to shed light on the subject. It appears Bulgaria’s finance minister Vladislav Goranov sold the Bitcoin stash to countries in the Middle East and large-scale Asian investors. The deal was conducted at the end of 2017 - the peak of Bitcoin’s price rally, with Goranov reporting to Bulgaria’s prime minister Boyko Borisov that he sold the Bitcoins at a price point of €15,000.