‘Tone deaf’ — US moves $2B Silk Road BTC after Trump’s stockpile pledge

Update July 30 at 4:20 am UTC: Added comment from Binance head of VIP & institutional, Catherine Chen.

The United States Government has just transferred $2 billion worth of Bitcoin — two days after former President Donald Trump promised that the US would never sell any of its Bitcoin during a speech in Nashville, in what one commentator has labeled “tone deaf." 

According to data from blockchain analysis platform Arkham Intelligence, the government wallet — which stored the Bitcoin seized from the shuttered dark web marketplace Silk Road in 2022 — transferred 29,800 Bitcoin ( BTC ) to an unknown wallet address on July 29.

The funds have since moved to another unknown wallet.

The transfer comes just two days after Donald Trump made a series of pro-crypto promises during a speech at the Bitcoin 2024 conference.

Trump promised the US government would not sell any of its currently-held Bitcoin and declared that he would make the US the “crypto capital of the world” by rolling out a series of crypto-friendly policies, including firing current SEC Chair Gary Gensler . 

In addition to Trump’s promise, Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis announced the introduction of legislation to make Bitcoin a strategic reserve asset of the United States.

The Wyoming lawmaker proposed a plan to purchase 5% of Bitcoin’s total supply and hold the digital commodity as a Treasury asset. Lummis called the proposal a 21st-century “Louisiana Purchase,” a reference to the purchase of the American Midwest from the French for $15 million in 1803.

Binance’s head of VIP & institutional, Catherine Chen, told Cointelegraph the recent spotlight on Bitcoin from Trump and other senior US officials was a “positive sign” for digital assets across the board. 

“What is clearly meaningful is that politicians and prominent industry leaders are explicitly stating their positions, recognizing the value of Bitcoin in the monetary system, and making it clear that crypto is important on their agenda,” said Chen.

“This likely means more regulatory clarity as governments need to make their stance clear.”

She added that Binance had recently introduced what it calls the Capital, People, Technology (CPT) Framework, to isolate specific structural factors that influence market dynamics.

“The establishment of strategic bitcoin reserves will drive structural conditions under all three categories of our CPT Framework, and advance the crypto market for the long term,” she said.

Crypto pundits respond to Silk Road transfer

Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz lashed out at the recent fund movement, calling it a “tone deaf” move by the current administration in a July 29 post to X.

Meanwhile, several crypto commentators suggest the transfer could be linked to a July 1 agreement between the US Marshalls Service and crypto exchange Coinbase, when they signed a deal with Coinbase to “safeguard” US Government crypto assets.

The US Government currently holds $12 billion in Bitcoin in reserve, with the vast majority of this sum coming from various confiscations and seizures of crypto assets from nefarious actors.

Related:  United States government holds $12B in Bitcoin — Arkham Intelligence

Not everyone is optimistic that Bitcoin could become a strategic reserve asset in the US with BlockTower Capital’s chief information officer Ari Paul saying the odds are not stacked in favor of the outcome that many are looking to with bullish optimis for the price of BTC in the mid-term.

Paul pinned the chances of Bitcoin becoming a US strategic reserve asset at 10:01 within the next four years.

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