Did the U.S. Government Fumble $17B of Bitcoin?

White House AI and crypto czar, David Sacks, recently commented on the US Government’s losses incurred by selling off Bitcoin seized by the government from civil and criminal proceedings. By his estimate, the US Government had sold off 195,000 Bitcoins over the last decade, netting $366M in proceeds. That figure is a far cry from what it would be worth today, which is over $17B.

This high-level acknowledgement from Sacks highlights a long-running debate: what is the best strategy for managing seized digital assets? His comment frames the government's previous policy of liquidating BTC as a massive financial opportunity cost for taxpayers. The $17B figure represents a significant potential loss that is now drawing official scrutiny at the highest levels of policy-making.

The majority of the proceeds originate from the sale of BTC seized from James Zhong, the hacker of the now-defunct dark web marketplace, Silk Road. These coins were seized in 2023, with 9,861 BTC liquidated in March 2023 for $215M. This is the figure reported by David Sacks in his report. However, Arkham notes that subsequent BTC sales were also made in June and July of 2023, and again from April to December of 2024 from the seizure, representing another $2.27B in proceeds. These were figures not reported by Sacks, which brings the actual total proceeds to $2.64B rather than the initial figure of $366M.

The massive discrepancy between the official Sacks report and the on-chain data is the core of the issue. While Sacks's report appears to be based on older, finalized liquidation figures, on-chain analytics shows government-controlled wallets in near-real-time. This suggests that official government reporting may be lagging significantly behind the actual movement and sale of these assets.

The US Government still holds 9,800 BTC from the James Zhong seizure, which is valued at $867.1M today.