David Bailey, a former aide of the Trump campaign, called for an audit of the U.S. bitcoin, stressing the current state of the digital assets owned by the U.S. was unacceptable. He remarked few or nobody was able to ascertain the state of the 200,000 BTC allegedly in possession of government agencies.
Calls to Audit US Crypto Holdings Rise After Strategic Crypto Reserve Announcement
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Calls to Audit US Bitcoin Holdings Rise With Trump Administration Strategic Crypto Reserve Announcement
The U.S. government’s bitcoin holdings are now in the spotlight after President Donald Trump announced the building of a strategic crypto reserve, containing BTC, ETH, and other digital assets.
Read more: Trump’s Bombshell: XRP, SOL, and ADA Enter the US Crypto Reserve Mix
While the U.S. allegedly holds nearly $200K bitcoin, crypto insiders are calling for a public audit of these funds, given their relevance for the upcoming policies of the Trump administration.
David Bailey, CEO of BTC Inc., has criticized how the U.S. government has carried the ownership of this large bitcoin stash. “It’s alarming that nobody seems to know exactly how many Bitcoin the USA owns, nor who specially holds the keys to roughly 200,000 Bitcoin,” he stressed, highlighting the importance of establishing a “sovereign-quality digital assets vault with proof of reserves.”
Bailey raised the possibility of a covert sale of these assets under the previous administration. According to an unnamed CEO of a large custody provider, carrying out a sale operation of 100K BTC would be trivial, using the bitcoin owned by other customers to throw off suspicion.
Timechainindex’s Sani added that one of the only custody providers able to pull this off would be Coinbase. The exchange had moved 8,000 BTC several times a couple of months ago, totaling more than 100K BTC.
“I will pay $10,000 to the first journalist who can get U.S. Marshals to confirm the quantity of Bitcoin and Crypto they’re currently holding,” Bailey proposed.
According to Arkham Intelligence, the U.S. government holds nearly 198K BTC, that have been seized as part of enforcement actions. Record indicated that 69,369 BTC were seized from Silkroad in November 2020, 94,643 BTC recovered from Bitfinex hackers in January 2022, and 51,326 BTC seized from James Zhong, also linked to Silk Road.
Read more: Global Crypto Power Plays: Which Governments Are Hoarding the Most Bitcoin?
