BTC is no longer just a new asset in the financial market, BTC has been widely accepted and entered national reserves. Currently, the US holds 207,189 BTC
[1] seized from criminals. At the present time, this amount of BTC is worth about 14B USD, a huge amount of money, making the US government the independent entity holding the most BTC, surpassing MicroStrategy with 193K BTC. And we can consider the US government as a big whale in the market, as each of its actions can create waves for the crypto market.
The US government recently made headlines in the crypto world by transferring 15085 BTC ~ 922M USD. This move coincided with the time BTC reached 60K USD, raising speculation about the US government's profit-taking strategy
[2].
The last time, in July 2023, the US government transferred 9800 BTC ~ 300M USD and then we saw an 18% decline in BTC price from 30K USD to 25K USD
[3]. This time, the community is also worried even though the BTC price has reached 68.5K BTC and is approaching ATH 2021.
Personally, I believe that the US government has a reason to take profits because they do not need to prove diamond hands. Their purpose is just to effectively handle the assets confiscated from criminals. The current price of BTC is attractive enough for them to sell and add to the national budget.
At the same time, I also believe that with the positivity in price fluctuations and the optimism of investor sentiment, this liquidation worth 1B USD from the US government will not cause any negative impact on the increasing momentum of BTC price as well as the crypto market. FTX sold 1B USD worth of GBTC in January
[4] and Genesis is selling 1.3B USD worth of GBTC
[5] also with no significant impact on BTC price. Therefore, I believe that in the context of the market being extremely excited and the daily BTC trading volume reaching up to 70B USD, the selling force of 1B USD from the US government, if any, is not worth our concern.
I would like to know your views on the possibility of selling 1B USD worth of BTC from the US government:
- Do you think the US government is about to sell 15,085 BTC?
- Will this event have a negative impact on BTC and the entire crypto market?
- Are you worried and changed your investment strategy because of this event?
References:[1]
Countries & Governments that Own Bitcoin[2]
US gov’t moved $922 million of seized Bitcoin after BTC price broke $60,000[3]
US Government Transfers $300 Million Worth of Seized Silk Road Bitcoins[4]
FTX Sold About $1B of Grayscale's Bitcoin ETF, Explaining Much of Outflow: Sources[5]
Genesis Cleared to Sell GBTC Shares Worth $1.3 Billion
Note:- My opinion was posted first in that topic, on Bitcointalk
- I leave the source link to avoid plagiarism accusation.
- I excluded/ included minor things from an original thread if necessary.
Update 2024.04.03:In a major cryptocurrency move, the U.S. government transferred 30,175 bitcoins (valued at around $2 billion) to a wallet associated with Coinbase.