After a plethora of bitcoin transfers yesterday, the German government has sent an additional $339.2 million worth of bitcoin to addresses labeled as belonging to centralized crypto exchanges and market makers so far on Tuesday.
The German government sent 800 bitcoins ($45.9 million) to the crypto exchange Kraken, 5,000 bitcoins ($287.1 million) to an address believed to be market marker B2C2 Group and nearly 107 bitcoins ($6.2 million) to market maker Cumberland DRW, according to onchain analytics platform Arkham. A further 400 bitcoins ($23 million) were sent to an unlabeled address.
It also appears to have received 1,692 bitcoins ($96.9 million) back from the crypto exchange Bitstamp on Tuesday.
The German government began moving bitcoin to exchanges last month, following the seizure of 50,000 bitcoins from the film piracy site Movie2k in January.
On Monday, the government-labeled addresses transferred more than 15,000 ($866 million) to addresses labeled by Arkham as belonging to market makers and exchanges.
However, 3,623 BTC ($203.7 million) were subsequently transferred back to the German government from Bitstamp, Coinbase and Kraken later in the day.
The exchanges most likely sent the bitcoins back to the German government after they could not sell them within a targeted price range, according to The Block's Research Director Steven Zheng.
“Considering some bitcoin were sent back to the German government from Coinbase, one can assume they were unsold bitcoin as part of a sale agreement between the crypto exchange and the country,” Zheng said.
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Less than half of the German government's seized bitcoins remain
The German government currently still holds 22,846 BTC, worth around $1.3 billion, Arkham's dashboard shows.
Last week, independent member of the German Bundestag, Joana Cotar, heavily criticized the government's decision to “hastily” sell the bitcoin in its possession, urging it to retain the funds as a strategic reserve asset.
The largest cryptocurrency by market cap is currently changing hands for $57,341, according to The Block's bitcoin price page, trading flat over the past 24 hours. However, bitcoin's price has fallen around 12% since the German government began moving funds to exchanges on June 18.
BTC/USD price chart. Image: TheBlock/TradingView.
Updated with additional details throughout.
