US to sell $130M Bitcoin from Silk Road seizure
US officials have unveiled plans to sell $117 million worth of confiscated Bitcoin in 2021, tied to illicit activities on the Silk Road “black market.”
BREAKING: 🇺🇸 US to sell $130m #Bitcoin from Silk Road seizure. pic.twitter.com/D4RV9hMLR9
— Bitcoin Archive (@BTC_Archive) January 25, 2024
In a notice dated January 8, 2024, the US government stated its intention to liquidate nearly 2,934 Bitcoins seized from Sean Bridges and Ryan Farace in 2021. Both individuals were linked to Silk Road, a black market facilitating the trade of prohibited goods in Bitcoin, which was shut down in 2013.
As of the current date, this Bitcoin stash is valued at approximately $117 million. In 2018, the US Department of Justice prosecuted Ryan Farace for allegedly selling banned substances through Silk Road. At that time, Farace falsely claimed to have lost access to the BTC acquired from the black market. The scheme to disperse Farace’s assets was uncovered in 2021, prompting authorities to take confiscatory action. By early January 2024, both Farace and his father had been sentenced to prison for money laundering.
The US government still holds more than 207,000 BTC seized from law enforcement operations, with an estimated value of nearly $9 billion. In March 2023, Chinese authorities sold 9,800 BTC, generating $261 million.
Although the US had initially announced plans for numerous BTC liquidations in 2023, this did not materialize, adding to concerns within the cryptocurrency community about potential “coin dumping” in 2024. Other entities contributing to this landscape include Grayscale, FTX, Mt. Gox, and Celsius.
More than 169M ALT without owner
ALTLayer Airdrop open was officially released and $ALT was listed on the Binance Exchange on January 25.
InJanuary 25, AltLayer opened the airdrop claim portal for users, based on the snapshot results on January 17. The first airdrop allocation is 300 million ALT tokens, accounting for 3% of the total supply of 10 billion tokens and worth approximately 87 million USD.
Airdrop recipients include those who participate in staking on Celestia (TIA) and EigenLayer, hold NFT OG, or have participated in the project’s community campaigns. According to the announcement, AltLayer will let TIA stakers receive airdrops next week.
Currency, 130.7M $ALT have been claimed in more than 29,000 wallets (about 34%). This means there are more than 169 million $ALT without owners. The Top 10 wallets hold 4.8M $ALT.
At the same time, Binance announced the listing of $ALT at 05:00 PM on the same day. Within the first 4 hours, ALT attracted more than $300 million in trading volume, according to CoinGecko data.
Also read:Â CRYPTO MARKET REVIEW IN 2023 AND NARRATIVES IN 2024