German Bitcoin Wallets Transfer $344 Million to Exchanges, OTC Desks

German government crypto wallets have moved approximately $344 million worth of Bitcoin to exchanges and over-the-counter desks this morning, according to blockchain analytics platform Arkham Intelligence.

Already this week, the German BKA wallets have moved $900 million worth of BTC on Monday and a further 362 million on Tuesday. The German law enforcement wallets now appear to have just north of $1 billion worth of Bitcoin left, according to Arkham.

The Wednesday morning transfers include $73 million sent to centralized crypto exchanges: $44 million to Kraken and $29 million to Coinbase. Roughly $98 million has been sent to crypto trading firms: $66 million has gone to Amersterdam’s Flow Traders in two transaction and another $31.5 million to Chicago’s Cumberland DRW. There’s also been another $132 million sent to a still unidentified wallet in two transactions.

Arkham wrote on Twitter yesterday that the unidentified wallet in question is likely an over-the-counter desk or depository institution. Another $40.5 million has gone to another unidentified address, bc1qu, in two different transactions. The wallet appears to have been first used in May, according to Blockchair, and received a $675,000 test transaction from the German government wallets on June 19—right before selling got underway.

Arkham has grouped five different wallets together to track the German Bundeskriminalamt as an entity on its platform. The BKA, also referred to as the Federal Criminal Police Office, seized $2.1 billion worth of Bitcoin in January as part of a sting on a piracy website.

“The Bitcoins were seized after a suspect voluntarily transferred them to government wallets provided by the BKA,” the agency said in a press release at the time. “This means that no final decision has yet been made about the disposal of the Bitcoins.”

There’s been no further official communication about the seized Bitcoin, but on June 19, the BKA began transferring its seized funds to exchanges. It has been steadily liquidating its holdings for the past three weeks.

In that time, the selling has drawn criticism from at least one German politician and an offer from controversial Tron founder Justin Sun to buy the remainder of the BKA’s Bitcoin holdings.

But for what it’s worth, analysts have pointed out that the Bitcoin market has shown that investors have been less spooked about Germany’s BTC selling than they were when it first started. The worst of Germany’s selling appears to be “in the rear-view mirror,” Ryan McMillin, chief investment officer at crypto fund manager Merkle Tree Capital, told Decrypt earlier today.

At the time of writing, the Bitcoin price is sitting at $58,500 after having inched past the $59,000 mark earlier today, according to CoinGecko. That means it’s managed to gain 1.6% since this time yesterday and is now trading for 3.3% less than it was this time last week.

Edited by Stephen Graves.