Curiously, the German government owns a substantial amount of cryptocurrency. The news has come as a bombshell! Another surprise is that the German authorities have been offloading Bitcoins for several weeks. The amount of BTC already sold is hundreds of millions of dollars! As a result, the crypto market has lost steam while the world's number one cryptocurrency is falling in value.

According to reliable sources, last month, the German government began selling crypto from a wallet belonging to the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA). Initially, 900 Bitcoins were sold, worth roughly $52 million. But it was only the beginning.

Last week, the German authorities sold another 3,000 Bitcoins for $172 million. Later, the German police sold another 2,739 BTC and other cryptocurrencies worth $155 million.

The digital assets were sold through cryptocurrency exchanges such as Coinbase, Bitstamp, and Kraken. No official comments followed from the German government.

Amid the sell-off triggered by the German authorities, the flagship cryptocurrency took a nosedive. Last Friday, on July 5, Bitcoin sank below $55,000 to the lowest level since February 2024. As a result, the cryptocurrency market lost over $170 billion in market capitalization within 24 hours. No wonder, this alarmed crypto investors.

Another catalyst for the plunge in Bitcoin's price was the substantial payouts from cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox which went bankrupt in 2014. Last Friday, the company began compensating some of its clients. According to CoinGecko, about 19.7 million Bitcoins are currently in circulation, valued at $1.1 trillion. Nevertheless, the Bitcoin sell-offs by the German authorities undermined market sentiment that pushed the first cryptocurrency down.

As for the origin of the digital assets owned by the German government, they were seized during a police operation in January 2024. At that time, the German authorities had almost 50,000 BTC worth $2.2 billion. Currently, the Federal Criminal Police Office holds 32,488 Bitcoins valued at $1.9 billion.