‘We have about 200,000 Bitcoin left’: Senior White House official

In a March 7 press call ahead of the first White House Crypto Summit, a senior White House official said the US government holds about 200,000 Bitcoin from forfeiture proceedings for its strategic reserve.

“We believe we have about 200,000 Bitcoin left, and were placing those in the strategic reserve so that we do have a long-term strategy to maximize its value,” they said.

According to the official, the US government came into possession of roughly 400,000 Bitcoin (BTC) through various criminal and civil proceedings, including the infamous Silk Road case, but about 200,000 was sold off “in an ad hoc manner over the past decade or so.”

The official added that the lack of a long-term strategic policy on what to do with the Bitcoin reserves cost the American taxpayers around $17 billion. The US governments crypto holdings will still be audited.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order to create a Bitcoin strategic reserve and digital asset stockpile on March 6. The move fulfilled a campaign promise made to the crypto community and furthered his agenda of making the US “the crypto capital of the planet.”

The executive order establishes that US Bitcoin holdings should never be sold. In addition, it allows for the secretaries of Treasury and Commerce to develop “budget-neutral” strategies for adding to that reserve. “It [the Bitcoin reserve] uses the digital assets [that] the United States government already owns.”

“If the Secretaries can figure out how to accumulate more Bitcoin without costing the taxpayers anything, then they are authorized to do that,” the official said.

According to the executive order, the Bitcoin strategic reserve and digital asset stockpile are separate and different in nature. While the Bitcoin strategic reserve can be added to through further purchases, the digital asset stockpile wont be able to do so.

US holds $18B in crypto, $122M in ETH: Arkham

According to Arkham Intelligence, the US government holds approximately $18 billion in its crypto portfolio. Although most of it ($17.6 billion) is in BTC, the crypto holdings also include $122 million in Ether (ETH), $122 million in Tethers USDt (USDT) and $24 million in BNB (BNB).

The coins and tokens have mostly likely come from criminal and civil cases where crypto has been forfeited. While the most high-profile cases of this are the different Silk Road BTC seizures, there are other instances, including the Bitfinex hack.

In addition to the coins and tokens already mentioned, the US government holds smaller amounts of other tokens, including Dai (DAI), Tron (TRX), Chainlink (LINK) and Uniswap (UNI).