$2B in Silk Road seized by the U.S Government to a New Wallet

The U.S. government has been in the crosshairs of the cryptocurrency industry as a wallet tagged as belonging to the government was noticed to transfer 30.17k Bitcoin to an unknown wallet.

Pretty mind-blowing, huh?

Yes, it is, indeed!

Bitcoin Stash Raises Eyebrows

News has it that the wallet under the control of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) came in the news while transferring Bitcoin worth around $2 billion to an uncharted wallet. 

If this has stirred your curiosity, hold on there is more to it!

From the speculated wallet, around 2000 BTCs that are worth over $130 million were sent to a Coinbase address. In fact, around BTCs worth $1.95 billion approximately was noted to be transferred to another wallet, which is reported to belong to the U.S. government as well!

Now that you are in the loop, let’s understand what is “Silk Road” & how is it related to the current issue.

A Glimpse of Silk Road

For those unaware, Silk Road was a digital black market platform, launched in 2011.

The platform was infamous for hosting illegal drug transactions and money laundering activities, using Bitcoin.

Silk Road was accessed through a network called “Tor” which anonymizes user data and activities online. Therefore, to obfuscate users’ addresses from unwanted parties, Tor was used as a tool to hide the real identities of the Silk Road participants. 

Regarded as the first darknet market, the platform was shut down by the FBI in 2013. Its founder Ross William Ulbricht is currently serving a life sentence in prison.

What’s causing Silk Road to resurface in the headlines?

Well, the reason lies in the recent dubious transfer of significant volumes of Bitcoin from the U.S. government’s wallet.

Interestingly, the wallet from which the fund of 30.17k Bitcoin was transferred held BTCs confiscated as part of the crackdown on the infamous Silk Road Hack in November 2021.

Notably, in June 2023, the United States authorities sold more than 9,000 Bitcoins confiscated in connection with the crime. The sale was worth approximately $206 million at the time.

According to CryptoQuant, the US government still holds approximately 209,000 seized Bitcoins worth $14 billion.

Is the Bitcoin Hype Showing Signs of Disturbance?

The news has triggered many opinions about the future of Bitcoin and its rising price. 

Santiment, a market intelligence platform, took to its X account to highlight the notable spikes in crowd interest surrounding Bitcoin consequent to the latest U.S. government activities and the speculative Silk Road hullabaloo. 

This behaviour suggests a contrarian indicator, wherein market movements deviate from the current sentiment. As a result, the on-chain analytic firm predicts that if fear persists, the cryptocurrency market will see more price hikes.

However, traders fear an incoming dump as well, which may affect the price of Bitcoin, which currently stands at $72,519.23, a hike of more than 3% in the last 7 days. 

At the moment the news broke, Bitcoin witnessed a lack of bullish sentiment. Nevertheless, despite a 5% decline in price, the world’s largest cryptocurrency amped up its price game eventually, crossing the threshold of $70,000. 

Wrapping it Up!

Despite fear of the potential Bitcoin sell-off impacting its price, the cryptocurrency has managed to pull up its game, indicating a comeback of bullish sentiment. Such price recovery of Bitcoin is essential amidst the ongoing Bitcoin halving frenzy!

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