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Bitcoin Government The Almighty Buck

The IRS Has Seized $1.2 Billion Worth of Cryptocurrency This Fiscal Year (cnbc.com) 76

Posted by BeauHD from the seizure-and-sale dept.
The U.S. government regularly holds auctions for its stockpile of bitcoin, ethereum, litecoin and other cryptocurrencies it seizes and then holds in crypto wallets. "In fiscal year 2019, we had about $700,000 worth of crypto seizures. In 2020, it was up to $137 million. And so far in 2021, we're at $1.2 billion," said Jarod Koopman, director of the IRS' cybercrime unit. CNBC reports: As cybercrime picks up -- and the haul of digital tokens along with it -- government crypto coffers are expected to swell even further. Interviews with current and former federal agents and prosecutors suggest the U.S. has no plans to step back from its side hustle as a crypto broker. The crypto seizure and sale operation is growing so fast that the government just enlisted the help of the private sector to manage the storage and sales of its hoard of crypto tokens.
[...]
Once a case is closed and the crypto has been exchanged for fiat currency, the feds then divvy the spoils. The proceeds of the sale are typically deposited into one of two funds: The Treasury Forfeiture Fund or the Department of Justice Assets Forfeiture Fund. "The underlying investigative agency determines which fund the money goes to," said [Sharon Cohen Levin, who worked on the first Silk Road prosecution and spent 20 years as chief of the money laundering and asset forfeiture unit in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York]. Koopman said the crypto traced and seized by his team accounts for roughly 60% to 70% of the Treasury Forfeiture Fund, making it the largest individual contributor.

Once placed into one of these two funds, the liquidated crypto can then be put toward a variety of line items. Congress, for example, can rescind the money and put that cash toward funding projects. "Agencies can put in requests to gain access to some of that money for funding of operations," said Koopman. "We're able to put in a request and say, "We're looking for additional licenses or additional gear,' and then that's reviewed by the Executive Office of Treasury." Some years, Koopman's team receives varying amounts based on the initiatives proposed. Other years, they get nothing because Congress will choose to rescind all the money out of the account.
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The IRS Has Seized $1.2 Billion Worth of Cryptocurrency This Fiscal Year More

The IRS Has Seized $1.2 Billion Worth of Cryptocurrency This Fiscal Year

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  • If you want to trade it for real one though, pay your fucking taxes.

    • Because paying taxes on inflation makes lots of sense- don't want people avoiding the money printing tax.

  • Slightly misleading title (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Wednesday August 04, 2021 @08:32PM (#61657469)

    Should read "The IRS seized a bunch of monopoly money currently exchangeable for $1.2B as of yesterday - might be $1.5B or $250M, depending on what the PRC decides in China tomorrow."

    • You can always tell when someone knew about Bitcoin when it was $1 but dismissed it. They're the ones yelling "it's not real!" the loudest, like the fox and the grapes.

    • Read TFS, those are the numbers after trading for cash.
    • They sell it as soon as it's seized, so it's worth whatever they actually sell it for. Doesn't make any difference what it's worth tomorrow, or even today.

  • I wonder what will happen when Bitcoin and its ilk are banned for being so troublesome.

    • When cryptocurrency is outlawed, only outlaws will have cryptocurrency. Wait, that's kind of the problem here now, isn't it?
    • Banned where? The United States? What are you saying, federal agents will go to peoples' houses and force them to turn over their private keys? Please...
      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • No, because no one gives a shit what you keep in your precious wallets. Hint: any cryptocurrency you keep in a wallet becomes irrelevant to the crypto "market".

        if you want to enter that same market through an exchange though, expect to file IRS forms pretty soon.

        • No, because no one gives a shit what you keep in your precious wallets.

          Businesses that take Bitcoin as payment do. They don't need to handle the cash. Heroin, for example. In Seattle you can become a very wealthy person by financing trafficking in the camps. You don't have to touch monry or the product. And you are assured of excellent police protection. Becsuse nonr of them are working the streets anymore.

          • Businesses that take Bitcoin as payment do.

            Very few do at face value. Most just convert your BTC to "real currency" on the spot.

            They don't need to handle the cash. Heroin, for example. In Seattle you can become a very wealthy person by financing trafficking in the camps.

            And it really doesn't make any difference if you never try to take that same BTC and go through an exchange; right until that point, you're just trading numbers. This is the reason why both the EU and the US are now pushing to de-anonymize exchange operations. They care about the interaction with real world markets.

            This should not be difficult to understand. The dollar value of BTC is formed on the only market for these: ex

      • No. They'll make it impossible to convert it into cash, since let's be honest... the value of bitcoin isn't in its ability to use as an actual currency. It's just a really good gambling token that you can exchange for cash with relative ease.

      • No need. You just have to exclude bitcoin from the financial sector. Pass a law forbidding banks from doing business with any exchange. You can still pass your bitcoin around in the shadow economy, but that's all it'll be good for. No way to spend it on non-criminal things without doing business with very shady companies in equally shady countries.

      • The US can realistcally do two things, just sever all financial connections of American companies with exchanges.

        If the US has/invents a casus belli they could sanction financial institutions internationally. Threaten to cut off from the US companies by connection to crypto by multiple degrees of seperation, to see how effective this threat is see Iran.

      • > Banned where?

        If only there was a way to find that answer [investopedia.com]. /s

        Bitcoin is banned in China, Russia (use as payment for goods or services), Vietnam, Bolivia, Columbia, and Ecuador.

  • ..is that unless they transfer the currency to another wallet, there could exist other copies of the wallet out there.

    As I understand it, a wallet is just a collection of the private keys used to transfer the currency elsewhere.

    So a wallet can be copied (keep backups!).

    A criminal could, even if his walled was seized, still use/transfer the cryptocurrency elsewhere as long as he has a copy of the wallet secret keys

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      Indeed. However moves from and to a _known_ wallet are blatantly obvious on the blockchain. So the person that seized wallet belongs to may just have a tad of a problem there if there are any moves.

    • Could do, but the government must be aware of this too, and I imagine will move all the seized currency to their own wallet at the earliest convenience.

    • They can transfer from wallet to wallet before holding it (if exchanging later). They don't have to hide the activity. And the fee for the transfer comes out of the seized asset itself, so I doubt there's a problem there either.

  • How is this any different to "Proceeds of Crime" laws where a criminal might lose his house because it was purchased with dirty money?

    A house's value is only determined by the market, much like a crypto currency.

  • Why can't the government just directly exchange the bitcoins for their current cash value. Bitcoins aren't an automobile or lake house.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bws111 ( 1216812 )

      You don't 'exchange' bitcoin for cash, you SELL bitcoin for cash. And the government has specified procedures for selling things. Bitcoin is not special.

  • Congress will likely vote themselves raises!
  • Now, the U.S. Government needs a subversive financial system to remain valuable, so they can keep their gains?

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