Yesterday, Bitcoin (BTC) wallets connected to Germany moved 10,627 BTC in multiple batches to crypto exchanges throughout the day. After weeks of selling off Bitcoin back to back, many fear Germany will exhaust its BTC holdings in a matter of days.
According to Arkham Intelligence blockchain data, the German government sent another 2700 BTC (worth around $154 million) to Bitstamp, 139Po, Kraken, bc1qu, and Coinbase yesterday.
In addition to the BTC moved earlier in the day, they successfully received a total of 4,169 BTC (worth about $239 million) from crypto exchanges and market makers in just one day.
Germany still has 7K Bitcoin left in its wallet
Currently, they have 6894 Bitcoin ($394.50M) left of the 49,857 BTC initially confiscated from Movie2k. Only 13.8% of the assets remain and might be exhausted sooner than we imagine.
For a few days now, several news reports worldwide have claimed that Germany is selling hundreds of millions of Bitcoins. This led to market distress and significant sell-offs from other uninformed parties.
However, the massive sell-offs witnessed are not from the entire country of Germany. They’re just from Saxony, a small German state in the east. In Jan. 2024, LKA – the German acronym for Saxony’s Criminal Police confiscated 49,857 BTC (nearly $3 billion with current prices) from the operator of Movie2k.to site. LKA found them guilty of many illegal activities, including money laundering.
In recent days, the crypto community has witnessed the German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) selling thousands of BTC to exchanges like Coinbase, Kraken, and Bitstamp, reducing the wallet’s holdings to their current state.
While many crypto enthusiasts criticized this massive Bitcoin sell-off, Saxony had no choice. It’s essential to clarify that what’s happening in Germany isn’t necessarily a bad investment. It’s simply the standard practice for confiscated assets in criminal investigations.
