US Government Moves $600 Million in Silk Road-Related Bitcoin to Coinbase Prime
Date: 2024-08-15 Author: Henry Casey Categories: IN WORLD
The US government moved 10,000 Bitcoins related to the Silk Road forfeiture case to institutional platform Coinbase Prime on Wednesday, according to blockchain data provided by Arkham Intelligence. The Bitcoins were previously held in a wallet labeled “US Government Seized Funds: Silk Road.”
While moving cryptocurrency to an exchange may indicate an intent to sell it, in this case it is possible that the funds were being moved for safekeeping. Last month, the US Marshals Service, a division of the Department of Justice (DOJ), announced a partnership with Coinbase Prime to “ensure the safekeeping and trading” of large digital assets. What exactly will happen to the tokens once they are on the centralized platform remains unknown.
Bitcoin fell from $61,000 to $59,000 within a day, but that weak move occurred before the funds were transferred. In 2022, the Justice Department announced the seizure of more than 50,000 bitcoins and the arrest of James Zhong, who pleaded guilty to wire fraud. Zhong was accused of manipulating transactions on the dark web marketplace Silk Road in 2012.
The government’s last confirmed sale of Silk Road-related assets was in March 2023, when it sold 9,861 bitcoins for $216 million, according to court documents. At that time, the government announced plans to sell the remaining assets in four installments over the course of the year, but there have been no reports of further sales since.
Currently, wallets linked to the US government contain about $12 billion in bitcoin and smaller amounts in other seized cryptocurrencies, according to Arkham Intelligence.
