US Government Moves $100M in Seized Crypto, No Sale

Wallets linked to the US government moved hundreds of millions of dollars in seized crypto to Coinbase Prime this week, and no sale has been confirmed.

Blockchain analytics firm Arkham traced 833.6 BTC, worth about $71.6 million, and roughly 40,285 BNB, worth $31.63 million, from wallets it labels as US government holdings to Coinbase Prime deposit addresses on Oct 7. The coins came from forfeited funds in the HashFlare fraud case and from seizures in the Bitfinex hack and Alameda Research cases, according to Arkham’s tracing as carried by several outlets.

The totals grew as trackers caught up. Arkham put a same-day figure at about $470 million, adding WBTC and USDT from the Bitfinex and Alameda seizures. Galaxy Research counted 9,261 BTC, or $770 million, sent to Coinbase Prime over two days, including 2,456 BTC from holdings not previously identified, which it read as possible new law enforcement seizures. Lookonchain put three-day deposits at 17,733 BTC, about $1.48 billion, plus 750 WBTC, and reported another 12,267 BTC, $1.01 billion, moved on Oct 8. Each figure covers a different wallet set and window, so the numbers describe one series of transfers rather than competing counts.

A transfer is not a sale

None of the trackers reported a sale. Coinbase Prime has been the US Marshals Service’s custodian for seized digital assets since July 2024, so a deposit can mean storage. A mid-July 2026 move of $288-297 million in seized crypto to the same platform turned out to be storage.

A sale of reserve Bitcoin would nonetheless clash with President Trump’s March 2025 executive order, which directs forfeited Bitcoin into a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve that “shall not be sold,” with exceptions for court-ordered distributions and victim restitution. The Marshals Service and the Justice Department have not commented on the transfers.

The market read it anyway

Bitcoin dropped 6.9% in the same window, briefly touching about $80,500, with roughly $1.14 billion in liquidations, about $930 million of them long positions. Macro pressures were also at work, including a 5.34% Treasury yield and a stronger dollar, and one market analysis concluded the unconfirmed sale alone does not explain the drop. The pattern is familiar: in December 2024, a transfer of 19,800 BTC from the Silk Road haul to Coinbase, then worth about $1.92 billion, coincided with a fall of more than 2% within 24 hours.

The US government remains the largest known state holder of Bitcoin, with Arkham’s estimates running from about 306,795 to 325,000 BTC, roughly $25-28 billion depending on the as-of date.