US government shifts $288M in seized crypto to Coinbase Prime
Regulation & Gov ·
Wallets tied to the US government moved bitcoin and ether worth roughly $288 million into Coinbase Prime custody, part of a portfolio Arkham estimates at more than $20 billion.
The transfer, first detailed by The Block, covered a mix of bitcoin and ether drawn from prior seizures and deposited into Coinbase Prime accounts. Arkham's tracking, referenced via its entity page for the US government wallet, shows the broader holdings include 324,552 BTC, underscoring how large a share of the total the $288 million move represents.
Some of the funds trace back to Silk Road-related seizures: separate reporting describes 3,940 BTC and 30,014 ETH moving from those cases to Coinbase, a detail that fed speculation about a possible sale even as assurances from the Trump administration have circulated. Other accounts in the cluster put the total figure closer to $297 million, describing transfers from multiple government-linked addresses and cases into Coinbase Prime deposits, a discrepancy that has not been reconciled across the reporting.
Coverage of the movement has appeared across at least six distinct sources, including CoinDesk and WuBlockchain, with on-chain trackers such as the post from OnchainLens also flagging the transfers as they occurred. The consistent thread across accounts is that the funds landed in Coinbase Prime, a custody arm typically used by institutional clients, rather than being sent directly to an exchange order book.
Moving assets into custody does not by itself confirm a sale; historically, government transfers to prime brokerage services have preceded both liquidations and continued holding. What remains unclear is whether this specific batch will be sold, held, or redistributed across other custodians, and why estimates of the transfer's size differ between $288 million and $297 million across outlets. Whether Arkham's $20 billion-plus portfolio figure will be revised as more transfers are tracked is also unresolved.