US authorities cleared to sell $6.58bn of Silk Road bitcoin

On December 30, 2024, the US Department of Justice obtained federal court approval to liquidate 69,370 BTC ($6.58bn at current prices) confiscated from the Silk Road darknet marketplace, DB News reported.

The US Govt has been given the greenlight to liquidate 69,000 BTC ($6.5B) from Silk Road, an official confirmed to DB News today

Interesting situation less than 2 weeks away from the new admin who vowed to not sell https://t.co/HqD1KnhJK3 pic.twitter.com/xn8ATSEL7H

— db (@tier10k) January 9, 2025

In October, Battle Born Investment, which had asserted claims to the seized assets through bankruptcy proceedings, lost in court. The group sought to reveal the identity of the person known as Individual X, who hacked Silk Road. It was from him that the authorities seized the bitcoins.

Battle Born Investment’s lawyer described the ruling as “another egregious example of the Department of Justice’s abuse of the civil asset forfeiture process”. According to him, the authorities used “procedural tricks” to avoid consideration of the case on the merits.

For its part, the department pressed for selling the cryptocurrency during the proceedings, citing its volatility. A Justice Department representative said that “the government intends to act in accordance with the ruling in this case”.

The last time the US moved Silk Road–linked funds was in early December 2024, sending 10,000 BTC to Coinbase Prime.

At the time of writing, the government in aggregate controls 203,239 BTC.

In December 2023, an appeals court formally recorded the forfeiture of 69,370 BTC that belonged to Silk Road, shuttered more than a decade ago. The funds were seized in November 2020.

In April 2024, a wallet controlled by the US government holding 30,174 BTC initiated a transfer of ~2,000 BTC to a Coinbase Prime address.

The US Marshals Service selected this service to provide custody and liquidation of high-capitalisation cryptocurrencies.