TECHNOLOGY

U.S. court approves sale of $6.5 Billion in Bitcoin seized from Silk Road dark web

Anonymous

08 Jan 2025 — 2 min read

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has been allowed to sell about 69,370 Bitcoin taken from the Silk Road darknet marketplace. This amount is worth about $6.5 billion right now, according to DB News on Wednesday. The sale will settle a long legal fight over who owns the Bitcoin.

On December 30, a federal judge approved the DOJ's request to sell a large amount of Bitcoin seized from the Silk Road case, according to the report. Battle Born Investments, a group claiming ownership of the Bitcoin through a bankruptcy estate, failed to delay the sale.

The group also tried to uncover the identity of “Individual X,” who originally gave up the Bitcoin, by filing a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, but this effort was unsuccessful too.

Battle Born’s lawyers criticized how the DOJ handled the case, accusing it of using “procedural trickery” to avoid proper review by using civil asset forfeiture.

The DOJ argued in court that Bitcoin’s changing value was a reason to sell the assets quickly. A DOJ spokesperson said, “The Government will proceed further consistent with the judgment in this case.”

This decision follows the U.S. Supreme Court’s refusal in October to hear Battle Born’s appeal against the seizure, which cleared the way for the government to sell the Bitcoin. At the time, the stash was worth $4.4 billion. The U.S. Marshals Service is expected to handle the sale, which could be one of the largest crypto sales ever.

News of the DOJ's plan briefly impacted the market, with Bitcoin’s price dropping from $95,000 to $93,800, based on CoinGecko data. It is now trading at about $94,300, down 3% in the last 24 hours.

The DOJ has not released an official statement about the sale yet.

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