The US Missed out on Over $1.7 Billion in Bitcoin by Selling Early

The US government seems to have missed out about $1.7 billion by held Bitcoins auctions too soon.

Cryptocurrency enthusiast Jameson Lopp, using historical and current market data, created a portal on Github that allows you to evaluate the amount of money that these auctions have brought since 2014.

From 2014 to date, US authorities have confiscated 185,230 Bitcoins in criminal investigations, including 4,040 Bitcoins, which will be sold in February of this year.

However, assuming that the bailiffs withheld all the Bitcoins confiscated over the past six years and sold them on February 9, 2020, when Bitcoin reached $10,000, they would receive $1.85 billion.

According to the data provided by Lopp, it can also be calculated that each Bitcoin was sold on average for $817.57, and all these coins brought the government $151 million.

The numbers also mean that the US government missed out about $1.7 billion, refusing to store these Bitcoins.

It should be noted that the British police now also hold auctions for the sale of cryptocurrencies seized from criminals.

On average, they sold each Bitcoin for $8365; so, the British sold coins at better prices than the Americans did.

The Bulgarian government, as previously reported, holds 200,000 BTC with a current value of $2 billion. Bulgarian media, however, say that they were sold to several funds and Asian investors for about $16.000 per coin — twenty times more profitable than in the United States.

Author: Marko Vidrih

Featured image credit: Pixabay