German Authorities Transfer $425 Million in Bitcoin

A wallet associated with the German government has transferred 6500 BTC (~$425 million) to a new address, with some of the funds ending up on exchanges. This is according to data from Arkham.

Initially, the wallet marked as German Government (BKA) held 50,000 BTC. According to Arkham, these funds were seized in January from administrators of the pirate movie site Movie2k.

Of the transferred amount, 2500 BTC were sent to another address, from which four transactions of 500 BTC each followed. The recipients in two of these transactions were the cryptocurrency exchanges Kraken and Bitstamp.

The transfer of such a large amount of bitcoin to trading platforms for potential sale has raised concerns in the community about negative impacts on the cryptocurrency’s price. One trader linked the transactions to an increase in short positions on digital gold and a “small dip” in its price.

The German government sent some coins to Kraken & Bitstamp 1-2 hours ago.

Explains the shorts coming in and small dip we saw on #Bitcoin earlier. https://t.co/qizbuWs5wd pic.twitter.com/wgweiINjOR

— Daan Crypto Trades (@DaanCrypto) June 19, 2024

At the time of writing, the German authorities still hold nearly 48,000 BTC valued at $3.1 billion.

In the United States, the government has faced accusations of “squandering” bitcoins from the national reserve, which was supposed to exceed 400,000 BTC.