Bitcoin Forum

If you visit the US department of Justice website, you will see a lot of press releases about the US seizing bitcoins. The US government has more bitcoins in her possession than any other any nation in the world as state in a Forbes article. According to this Forbes, the US government is sitting on a stash of 207,189 bitcoin, worth $5 billion, by far the largest such state-owned hoard.

Between 2011 - 2023, the U.S. has auctioned of some bitcoin holdings said to be worth $366.5. million. Other countries that have seized and sold off bitcoins holding are Australia, Germany, Netherlands. I want to know, when the government of a country who have seized bitcoins decide to auction it off, do they auction the bitcoin based on the price as at the time it was seized or at the current market price which is the time it is being auctioned off?

Cited Sources
- https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2023/06/16/us-government-owns-way-more-bitcoin-than-any-other-countryso-why-arent-they-selling-it/?sh=33e7184e1f32
- https://search.justice.gov/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&affiliate=justice&query=U.S.+Seizes+Virtual+Currencies

its an AUCTION
so certified entrants that are allowed to enter the auction make a bid. highest bid wins
so its not market rate, its bid rate of whomever turns up and makes best offer

usually the bidders make offers below current rate.. so the receiver gets a good deal compared to current market rate. but its usually a fair amount to outpace the competing bids. so maybe not much discount

These Bitcoins auctioned are mostly seized by the government as a result of illicit activities of the owners as at the time of seizures. Most of them are drug related, money laundering, trafficking and lots more. While the auctioning is done, the government can generate revenue from the auctioned Bitcoin to aid in other governmental activities. These Bitcoins are auctioned outside market price possible higher or lower but I believe the binding price wouldn't settle for a lower price.

One thing about this auction is that the guests are all invited and anyone you see there are strictly on invitation. So therefore it is not anyhow thing to start with as the government is fully involved in the process.

As franky1 had stated already, since it's an auction sales, they make it available for everyone to show interest and make offer and the highest bidders go with the offer deal, but to me isn't this inappropriate as well, for them to seize some worth assets of currency from some set of people and yet sell them out to others, how are we sure they aren't making the offer for themselves, why not selling into the bitcoin network been distributed to buyers over the network across, then another thing to ask is what they use these funds for after the auction, back to their pause or back to the society,  are there past records to serve as evidence on the appropriate utilization of these funds.

It’s not a sales but rather an aucion. The price will be dictated by the bidders and possibly close the current price or a little bit higher since we are talking about bulk purchase here on a same price which you can do on exchange with thinner volume.

The government has no legal obligation to sell it on the price when it was seized since they need to maximize profit from it. Many institutional investors accumulate their Bitcoin holding from this kind of huge haul auction from government and miner that’s why the price is not heavily impacted despite some whale surprsingly manage to stash huge chunk of Bitcoin which in reality should pump the price hard if they purchase on the open market.

The highest bidder will win the auction. the process is certain as with the auction of other confiscated goods which can be in the form of physical assets. house or car.
not everyone can participate in such an auction, one may have to have a particular membership. and about the price, usually the committee will determine the initial price first, I don't know where to start. but to make it more attractive, of course, it must be below the market price. and competition from bidders that will determine price increases.

This auction goes the same for every seized item by the government which may be property or fiat money from laundering or whatever so its bitcoin they seized is sold too so the government can use it for funding themselves on anything you may not like it but that's what the law says and if there is any inside job going in that auction then the dirt will go to the government which they may not want it so I assume the auctions are fair but laws but ethically we can't speak anything.

They likely start at the current Bitcoin price. It's also possible they firstly get them mixed to sell at the current price or buyers buy below the current price because crime money should be worth-less, then the buyers get them mixed & re-sold at current Bitcoin price.
Notwithstanding, the real value of cursed or crime money/coins, which are supposed to be destroyed, can't be hidden, even with mixing services. They will always be worth less and have little to zero effect on the price of Bitcoin.
The seized coins are cursed and worth less than billions

In the auction, the commodity can be sold above or below the current price. It depends on the interest of the bidders and the worth of the auction goods. The government also wants to make a profit so will not be stupid to sell at the former price or below the current price. When the US government auctioned off 29,655 bitcoins in 2014, out of 40 bidders it was Tim Draper, who bought all and it was sold above the market value of June 2014. These funds are kept in the Department of the Treasury’s Forfeiture Fund and are used to finance law enforcement agencies, building and furnishings prisons, and support victims of crime.

They can continue to seize it but they can never deny the fact that it will remain decentralized. They are working with many agencies and other nations to implement strong rules and taxes over the Crypto, good luck to them. There exist Decentralized marketplaces where you can sell your Crypto for Fiat if you want or you can even use the Crypto Debit Cards provided by various exchanges, so pretty much you stay in crypto the whole time.

Everything is just talk though, there were real numbers of how much was being seized even the Silk Road's BTC I think the numbers aren't right. Let's say the Mtgox coins are also seized because, after all, the US government can get a hold of those people despite them living elsewhere in the world. So there is much more than that 207,189 BTC.

The old exchanges since the past decade I think also have a ton of BTC since the time when it was just so cheap that they must have accumulated millions like the Yobit exchange that still operates even today. I think they are supported by the Russian government because it's still not shut down.

Because Silk Road seizure contributed a lot to those seized amount of bitcoin.

As of now, all holdings relate to the seizure of BTC originating from Silk Road. (https://bitcointreasuries.net/entities/69) and the amount is 41,491 BTC. I check with Buybitcoinworldwide.com (https://buybitcoinworldwide.com/treasuries/#countries) and find differences between two websites.

USA government has 207,189 seized bitcoin and already auctioned and sold more than 195,000 seized bitcoin (https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2023/06/16/us-government-owns-way-more-bitcoin-than-any-other-countryso-why-arent-they-selling-it/?sh=4ca773651f32), but still holds seized bitcoin.

The 41,491 BTC is from 50,000 BTC (https://www.coindesk.com/business/2022/11/07/us-attorney-announces-34b-crypto-seizure-related-to-silk-road/) seized from James Zhong. Government already sold 9,861.17 BTC (https://www.coindesk.com/business/2023/03/31/us-government-sold-216m-of-seized-silk-road-bitcoin-this-month) on 14 March.

U.S. Attorney Announces Historic $3.36 Billion Cryptocurrency Seizure And Conviction In Connection With Silk Road Dark Web Fraud (https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/pr/us-attorney-announces-historic-336-billion-cryptocurrency-seizure-and-conviction). It is 50,676.17851897 BTC from this seizure.

AUCTION price is always on a lower price rate so bidders can afford it and also make gains out of if they want to sell or invest it.
That amount of coin being seized by the Government is staggering. I would sincerely like to be present in the next AUCTIONING, because is always on a give away prices, so maybe I could lay my hands on some of the ones I could afford.

nobody is gonna pay over spot price.... It has to be a deal or why do it

So since the highest bidder buys below the current rate, they are literally buying low and when they eventually have custody of it, they may now sell high and take profit. This is what I thinking but correct me if my logic is flawed.

Yes, from the word being used which its an auction then it would really be pertaining about bidding which it would really be just that right that there would be a floor price before the bidding starts

but i do believe that it would be ending up on not so much gap or too far with the current price or market value on the time that bidding starts. I do rather see that -10% of the market price
is really that a steal.

I did make some search on how bidding been made or been done then i found this.
The Bitcoins were also only available for bid in nine “blocks,” each containing about 3,000 units. The government estimated these blocks would sell for about $1.8 million each.

Source: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/government-auctions-bitcoin-silk-road-seizure

This is Silkroad seized Bitcoins btw.

No they cannot start such an auction at the current price cause no one is going to go over it then when they can simply go to an exchange and make their purchase.

I thought that it was Bulgaria that has got the most seized Bitcoin. But I don't know if it's kind of outdated already or the USA has managed to overtake that spot from there. Anyway, regardless of the price of when these Bitcoins were seized, other members have already said it correctly that it was an auction and it's who will bid the highest gets it. Maybe, it can be higher than the current price or even lower depending on who's bidding the highest. That's why whoever gets to wait from these biddings could also be the financial institutions that have been eyeing to get into these auction of seized Bitcoins because they could be cheaper and more.

Yes, and as far as I know, the auction price starts at very cheap or at a discount at the current price. And that's why those early in the game was able acquire huge amount of bitcoin because they bought it at the government auction and then just hold.

So lucky for those who have the capital to start and go with this auctions and then bid against each other.

These auctions should be widely promoted, so the news could reach the maximum number of potential buyers as possible, increasing the value the government would raise with the sale. However, since these deals are too good for the buyer compared to market's prices, these auctions happen and most citizens don't even know about that.

I say this, because the same happens with lands and properties auctions which are very common in many countries. I wouldn't doubt governments have their favorites, because not everyone will follow their publications closely to know auctions' dates, while people who are close to power will know about it automatically.

The auctions are public as I said so anyone with the money can bid so whoever is going with the highest bid will get that if people are not aware of such auctions it's their ignorance that causes them loss but sure they are not the actual person who is going to bid on these. The actual bidders are aware of them and have a pile of cash with them which they usually keep making so another reason why the rich get richer.

The auction price is not for all,only for some selected high profile investors and it is done strictly by invitation because we are talking about millions of dollars. It do normally start from a low price so that it can have the value of auction in it. It is finally sold to the highest bidder but at a low price compared to the current price of bitcoin at the period.

Auction is all about demand, the amount the players are bidding and whoever does the last call without anyone interfering in the bidding price wins the item. However, before they start, there is going to be a floor asking price that can't be changed lower at an initial launch. For instance, if the US government decide to raise some revenue through the seize bitcoin, they can decide to sell 50 from their balance and put the initial price at $15k, you know everyone will want to have it and that is how more bid will keep coming until the last person doesn't have a competitor bidding for the price again and the last person will be the person the bitcoin will be sold for, anyone can bid the bitcoin for any price as long as it is above that $15k floor price.

The problem with auctioning is that only the rich and invited members are always allowed to visit such places, a common guy like you and I wouldn't get the chance. Funny how people's bitcoin where seized for the benefit of tax and rich men, spit on these old men.

Wow, so if there's bidder conspiracy, you can easily buy large amounts of bitcoin at the price of a dilapidated car if you can. That's pretty cool. I haven't participated in any government sponsored auction but don't most of them start the bid price at an out of touch price? I've seen one video of impounded motorcycle auction and they're selling junks at a premium. Regarding membership, I don't think that you need to have any to participate in a government auction, you just need to know where to go and where you can register.

When offloading such coins on an auction platform,  it can not be sold based on market value as this could change the nature of the transaction and I believe government seized items all go through public auctions to avoid any conflict of interest from within...though to protect the market they could reserve a minimum selling price to avoid crashing our crypto markets as they are stake holders in this :)

Yeah you need to register for approval to be able to participate in a BTC auctions by the U.S. government, you'll also have to make a deposit of $200,000 to be able to participate, if for any reason you are disqualified from the auction or you don't win in the bid, your $200,000 will be returned to you.
I don't think this is a problem, the U.S. government usually sells a large amount of coins, and the auctions are online and open, but you'll have to make an initial depost of $200,000 to just participate in the auction, "common people" cannot afford that, neither do they have the money to buy the coins that's being actioned. The "common guy" must not buy BTC's from government auctions if truly that's their only hinderance, they can purchase through exchanges or OTC, but that's not it, the amount in question here can only be purchased by the rich and also by institutions.

value's transient nature takes center stage. When governments, like the U.S., seize these bitcoin, they often move to auction them. They don't live in the past. Auctions reflect the market's current mood, the price now, not the ghost of what was. Bitcoins, seized in years gone by, don't carry a timestamp. The market speaks in the present tense. So, the U.S., Australia, Germany, or the Netherlands, they all sell Bitcoin by the present market rate

It's akin to fishing. When you catch a big one, do you measure its value by the time spent waiting, or by the weight at the dock? The weight, always. That said, numbers, like that $366.5 million, can deceive. It's easy to mix meanings. Auctions, seizures, valuations - all complex, all interwoven. But remember, Bitcoin's nature, its essence, defies simple definitions A note, though: even with the crispness of numbers, there's room for error. With Bitcoin, the only certainty is uncertainty. One must tread wisely, but also with fervor. The future's never written, not in Bitcoin, not anywhere.