The U.S. Marshals Service is auctioning almost $37 million in bitcoin on February 18th, 2020. This sealed bid auction is for 4,040.54069820 Bitcoin, forfeited in various federal criminal, civil and administrative cases, and the required deposit to participate in this auction is USD$200,000.00. Foreign citizens can participate in the auction – however, bids will not be accepted from any person or entity that appears on the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control list of “Specially Designated Nationals.”
The bitcoin auctions are not new. The U.S. Marshals Service have issued ten of them over the years.
Venture capitalist Tim Draper, the sole winner of a similar 2014 auction took home 29,655 bitcoin from the U.S. Marshals Service when BTC was worth about USD$636. The market value of the 29,655 BTC was USD$18,860,580 on July 1, 2014, in the sealed-bid auction that drew more than 40 bidders, including a number of well-known players in the crypto-currency.
But it was never revealed how much Draper’s winning bid was. At the height of Bitcoin Bull run in December 2017, BTC was worth USD$19,891.00 which would have Draper holding USD$589,867,605 if he hodled. Today 30,000 BTC is worth a mere USD$270,419,200. 😯
Potential bidders must register by Feb. 12.
This sealed bid auction is separated into four series:
- Series A (5 blocks of 500 Bitcoin)
- Series B (10 blocks of 100 Bitcoin)
- Series C (10 blocks of 50 Bitcoin)
- Series D (1 block of 40.54069820 Bitcoin).
Submitters will not have the opportunity to view other bids and will not have the opportunity to change bids once submitted.
