Silk Road Bitcoin Worth Nearly $2B Moved to Coinbase Prime

6 months ago

Nearly $2 cardinal worthy of forfeited bitcoin (<a href="https://www.coindesk.com/price/bitcoin" target="_blank">BTC</a>) linked to the Silk Road website were moved to crypto speech Coinbase Prime connected Monday.

A wallet tagged arsenic "U.S. Government: Silk Road DOJ Confiscated Funds" transferred 19,800 bitcoin connected Monday to a caller code with nary anterior past of transactions, <a href="https://intel.arkm.com/explorer/tx/876b851b4b3ec4f43d53e9b71302260090622a7c91ca719596dcad5f140e76c0" target="_blank">blockchain data</a> by Arkham Intelligence showed. The funds were past deposited to Coinbase Prime.

The transportation apt indicates that the authorities is preparing to merchantability oregon has already sold the assets. Earlier instances of authorities selling this twelvemonth sparked sizable selloffs successful bitcoin, but the enactment contiguous — truthful acold — has been much muted, with the terms dipping a spot much than 1% to the existent $95,800 since the quality hit. Following this move, the U.S. authorities inactive holds $18 cardinal worthy of seized crypto assets, per Arkham.

The Department of Justice announced successful 2022 that it <a href="https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/us-attorney-announces-historic-336-billion-cryptocurrency-seizure-and-conviction" target="_blank">seized</a> implicit 50,000 BTC and arrested James Zhong, who pleaded blameworthy to ligament fraud aft the authorities alleged helium manipulated the transaction strategy of acheronian web marketplace Silk Road successful 2012.

Last month, U.S. territory tribunal of Northern California requested progressive parties to "stipulate that authorities whitethorn liquidate immoderate oregon all" of the forfeited integer assets related to Silk Road and holding connected the funds portion an ongoing FOIA enactment resolves.

The past confirmed merchantability of Silk Road assets by the authorities was successful March 2023 selling astir 10,000 BTC for $216 million, tribunal filings show. The authorities laid retired plans successful the filing to merchantability the remaining assets successful 4 tranches during that year, but determination wasn't follow-up connection astir immoderate income since then. Earlier this year, the U.S. Marshals Service, a part of the DOJ, <a href="https://www.coinbase.com/blog/u-s-marshals-service-chooses-coinbase-to-safeguard-trade-its-large-cap" target="_blank">announced</a> a concern with Coinbase Prime to "safeguard and trade" the government's large-cap integer assets.

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