A cryptocurrency wallet associated with the German government has moved over 3,000 Bitcoin, valued at more than $172 million, to three crypto exchanges and another wallet.
On July 4, blockchain investigator PeckShieldAlert reported a significant transfer of 1,300 Bitcoin (BTC) from a wallet labeled “German Government (BKA).” This $75 million worth of Bitcoin was distributed across three major crypto exchanges: Coinbase, Kraken, and Bitstamp.
Source: PeckShieldAlert
Further analysis by Cointelegraph found that the German government wallet also transferred an additional 1,700 BTC to a different wallet address at the same time. The PeckShield team confirmed to Cointelegraph that the wallet had moved a total of 3,000 BTC. While the initial 1,300 BTC were sent to centralized crypto exchanges, the remaining 1,700 BTC were transferred to another cryptocurrency wallet, as per data from the on-chain analytics platform Arkham Intelligence.
German government sent 1,700 BTC to an unlabeled crypto wallet address. Source: Arkham
Impact on Bitcoin selling pressure
The German government has transferred more than 3,000 BTC to various exchanges over the past two weeks. These significant transfers, alongside upcoming repayments from Mt. Gox and similar actions by the United States government, could potentially increase selling pressure on Bitcoin.
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Since February 2024, the German government-labeled wallet, which held 50,000 BTC, has been reducing its holdings substantially over recent months. Governments worldwide, including Germany, have confiscated Bitcoin and other digital assets linked to criminal activities and occasionally auction off these assets.
The United States government has already sold a large portion of Bitcoin associated with the notorious dark web marketplace Silk Road. In 2014, American businessman and Bitcoin advocate Tim Draper purchased 29,656 BTC from the Silk Road cache at an auction organized by U.S. marshals.
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