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US Government To Release Half Its Bitcoin Intended for Trump's Strategic Reserve

• https://www.activistpost.com

This bitcoin, as seen publicly on the blockchain via Arkham Intelligence, totals 94,643 BTC currently worth $9.4 billion at the time of writing.

Just five days before pro-Bitcoin Donald Trump is sworn into office for a second term, the U.S. government seems to be on the verge of sending a large chunk of U.S. held bitcoin back to Bitfinex. Last summer, at The Bitcoin 2024 Conference in Nashville, Donald Trump pledged to create a national strategic bitcoin stockpile using the bitcoin already held by the government obtained from hacks, seizures, etc. According to Arkham Intelligence data, the U.S. currently holds 198,109 bitcoin worth over $20.1 billion. If these coins from the Bitfinex hack are to be sent back to Bitfinex — that would cut Trump's promised strategic reserve by 47.77% down to 103,466 BTC.

https://twitter.com/BitcoinMagazine/status/1817307986848813302

It makes me bullish that if the government is going to be acquiring mass amounts of bitcoin in the near future and over the long term, then I would want them to start from as close to 0 as possible, because that would require them to market buy more and push the price higher. The bitcoin should be returned in-kind, the court document stated, ensuring the Bitfinex hack victims receive their due bitcoins, meaning those coins will not need to be sold for dollars, relieving any downward pressure on bitcoin's price from that would be sale. Plus bitcoin getting returned to its rightful owner sounds like the right thing to do, and I'm sure Bitfinex will be thrilled to get their coins back.

However, if the U.S. government is going to be mass buying bitcoin for a strategic reserve, then Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis' proposed legislation for that would need to be signed into law. As it stands from just Trump's promise, he would just initially keep the seized bitcoin held on the government balance sheet as the strategic reserve, with the potential of acquiring more BTC by other methods, but made no hard promise on that. Senator Lummis' proposed bill would see the United States buy 200,000 bitcoin per year, for 5 years, until it has accumulated a total of 1,000,000 bitcoin.


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