A German government agency has transferred a significant amount of Bitcoin, valued at $425 million, to another wallet and various crypto exchange deposit wallets.
According to data from Arkham, the movement involved 6,500 BTC, with $32 million worth of Bitcoin deposited each to Kraken and Bitstamp exchanges.
The wallet address linked to these transactions has been identified as belonging to the German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA). The transfer included a portion sent to the address “bc1q0unygz3ddt8x0v33s6ztxkrnw0s0tl7zk4yxwd” before some funds were returned to the original wallet. Arkham CEO Miguel More noted that around $130 million in BTC was directed to “service wallets,” which generally indicates an intent to sell shortly.
The BKA had previously seized nearly 50,000 BTC (worth over $2 billion at the time) from the operators of Movie2k.to, a film piracy website active in 2013. According to Arkham’s analysis, the suspects voluntarily transferred the Bitcoin to the BKA in mid-January.
The recent transfer has raised questions about the purpose behind moving such a substantial amount of Bitcoin to exchanges and the potential market impact. Concerns about regulatory scrutiny and market manipulation have been noted. Notably, large transfers by government agencies could lead to market volatility. The precise reasons for the German government’s transfer of Bitcoin to exchanges are yet to be disclosed.
Read more: FG Drops Tax Evasion Case Against Binance’s Gambaryan.
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