The leading cryptocurrency held by U.S. authorities totals 205,515 BTC (about $5.6 billion at the time of writing) — more than 1% of the coin’s supply.
The US Government is one of the biggest #Bitcoin whales ?
Since 2020, they seized 215k+ $BTC — currently holds at least $5.65b worth
That’s 1%+ of the total circulating supply ?
This dash by @0xcarlosg & @21Shares breaks it all down ?https://t.co/JxnDDqqtsf
— Dune (@DuneAnalytics) March 23, 2023
Since 2020, the United States Department of Justice has seized about 215,000 BTC linked to criminal activity. Among them:
- 69,370 BTC, linked to the Silk Road darknet marketplace (November 2020);
- 94,643 BTC, seized from a married couple involved in the Bitfinex hack (January 2022);
- 51,326 BTC, confiscated from James Zhong, who hacked Silk Road (November 2022).
Dune notes that this is a ‘low estimate’, based on publicly available information.
Earlier, PeckShield documented the movement of 48,998 BTC from the wallets of the U.S. government. 30,174 BTC and 8,999 BTC were moved to two new addresses, and a further 9,825 BTC were sent to the American cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase.
In March 2023, authorities in Germany and the United States, with the participation of other countries, shut down the ChipMixer infrastructure and confiscated 1,909.4 BTC.