Topic: 10 BTC Casascius up for auction on Stacks Bowers (Read 1275 times)

Not that I am aware of and have read many things about Silk Road 1/DPR...

They redeem them. Who knows what happens to the physical remnants. Maybe they melt them down into USD silver/fiat?

No idea really, but let us know what they say if you contact them about it, would be interesting I guess?

Is there any evidence that DPR, or one of the marshal's dealt with, or acquired physicals in any way? Pretty sure that a coin and its addy with that kind of verifiable provenance, has a premium attached (unlike it being owned by Charlie Lee).

And, who is going to contact the DOJ to ask what they do/did with peeled physicals?

IANAL, but I am the son of one, and I was of the same opinion, that he bought direct from Mike, so whoever bought them should be fine.

Laws are a bitch, but I can find my way to look them up thanks to my dear dad at least.

As for the silver bars, I got a good laugh at that myself, and no idea. Maybe he doesn't /didn't know much about PM's?

With how many coins he has along withthe original flaps and blue tape, I would not be surprised if he bought from Mike directly back in the day. Confiscating the "stolen" BTC fcrom someone who received it in an entirely legal transaction would seem unlikely, particularly if they also seized the item purchased with the BTC -- that's double dipping  .

As far as anyone knows, all the physical BTC he had was seized, and its looking like the government decided to peel which I think makes sense in this case as they have a liquidation timeline. I do wonder what they are doing with the spent coins- maybe keepsakes for the agents, maybe returned to Zhong as 'empty' (unlikely), or auctioned off?

What I find particularly funny is the tiny-ass silver bars he had stashed away along 170+ BTC and small mountain of cash.. was he thinking diversification?

   Elias...awesome article and one for the history books for sure!

    With all that money/BTC the guy could've bought a private island away from it all and dissapeared for life and still be a king of his castle so to speak.

     BTC loaded on coins is a nice way to wash BTC from being tracked....I wonder what happens when the seller of say the 25 BTC cas coin gets the illegitamate BTC the feds are tracking....will that be considered stolen BTC/property and would that be confiscated?

A great read.  Ty.

Thats hilarious.

Nicely done Elias 

I need to point out that I wrote an article about this case for Cointelegraph 

https://cointelegraph.com/magazine/3-4-billion-bitcoin-popcorn-tin-silk-road-hacker/

That article also gives the number of seized Cas coins and total value: "25 Casascius coins (physical bitcoin) worth about 174 BTC";

Almost same no. of coins, same total BTC as per [quote link=topic=5463281.msg62742820#msg62742820 date=1692896989]
...
If we follow the 173 BTC, first it is joined by the proceeds (minus fees) of another Cas1 piece (which, was spent a couple of hours earlier (testing?) to the same address, which (also as a test) was split as 0.01 BTC going to the same 3BGbd address as the 174....

...the redeeming and spending of these 26 Cas coins is part of the consolidation (sale?) of Loaded's confiscated hoard.
[/quote]

...so they are, I'd say almost certainly those coins and the peeling was most likely DOJ (or expert contracted to them) meaning stillherehodling, seek3r, Mbitr were right!

I'm still intrigued as to whether all those 10 BTC UTXOs, the 79.2s (and others moved / split / joined within hours) - all coming from a UTXO that came indirectly from a 9k tx from March 2023 which, a couple of hops further back, was itself formed from multiple 1k UTXOs in March 2022 are also to do with Loaded's stolen stash?

But it would take someone with more skills / tools / time than I have for that.

The guy in the article is also this guy here - https://bitcointalksearch.org/user/loaded-73652

What a f'ckn idiot hacker/scammer....  

https://news.bitcoin.com/us-announces-historic-3-36-billion-cryptocurrency-seizure-as-silk-road-bitcoin-thief-pleads-guilty/

   That is some treasure trove they got there! I can only dream of owning these loaded!

   What exactly was in the roll with the blue tape? 1 BTC Cas coins?

If I may don my tinfoil hat and join the party at this late stage ...

There's a few fascinating things about the spending of these six Cas 25s last month:

First is that not only were, as pointed out above, they in the same block, they were all inputs in a single transaction of 173 (+ dust) BTC - and here's the thing...
...along with a Cas 5 piece and 18 x assumedly 2012 brass 1s (plus dust UTXOs those same coins). https://mempool.space/tx/6f72bcab8f2f9870cec6223411ce982d18d4bca2a085df7c641051ec500f3d64#vin=29

The BCH from the same coins was also sent as a single tx. https://blockchair.com/bitcoin-cash/address/1GLXybywwsGjV6YrVM16nb3GZWKzLG3uX1 (but not BSV)

That's not some randomer (or burgler) 'sweeping' coins one-at-a-time but someone with sufficient expertise to presumably create a complex online unsigned txs using the coins' addresses and separately inputting the privkeys to an off-line device for signing for both forks - at least I think there's a high probability that's how it was done.


If we follow the 173 BTC, first it is joined by the proceeds (minus fees) of another Cas1 piece (which, was spent a couple of hours earlier (testing?) to the same address, which (also as a test) was split as 0.01 BTC going to the same 3BGbd address as the 174 (multi-sig, or non-native segwit?)

Now here's where my tinfoil-hattedness might be getting off the rails....

Within 20 mins, the funds are on the go again, this time, being joined by a whole bunch of 10BTC UTXOs. This could, of course, be an exchange wallet, as could the 3BGbd address but what are all those 10 BTC native-segwit  UTXOs?!

Tracing them back, they all appear to come from UTXOs of 79.2xxx BTC and one hop further back has them all come from a single UTXO of 8.2k BTC - all of which happened on that same day.

So what to draw from that? First, to be clear, it's all guess work of course and I'm no sleuth and have no access to chain analysis tools or 'known' addresses, just simply someone intrigued clicking through a blockchain explorer... But my guess is that this is evidence that could support the theory that the redeeming and spending of these 26 Cas coins is part of the consolidation (sale?) of Loaded's confiscated hoard.

Just my thoughts - and btw. even though we've departed so far from the original topic of this thread, I've enjoyed how, step-by-step we got here

Well, for me, thats the recently peeled x6 25s. Thanks for posting.

That blue tape is Caldwell's handy work, also. 

 

Have a look at this article 

https://coinmarketcap.com/alexandria/article/50-676-btc-seized-by-u-s-detectives-found-stolen-crypto-in-bottom-of-popcorn-tin

so these pics are from seized items from the authorities ?

Knew I had the photo somewhere - apologies going very off topic now

I guess you are talking about "Loaded" from here. Yeah they fund a few Casascius-Coins at the time he got arrested.


Yeah I agree on that. Most likely no "value" for them. Still breaks the hearts of all crypto collectors. 

I don't think they'll sell them to collectors if that's what you mean. My guess: it stays in a box labeled "evidence" for many years.

Seized physicals, maybe?? (im thinking the recent young fat asian guy with glasses, whos name i cant remember and video i cant find, whos officially seized physical collection was flashed on screen for a second) ....which begs the question, what would US authorities do with these after they possibly peeled them?

Now seems like an odd time to peel those coins. Maybe someone passed away or there was a robbery. It makes little sense to hold for so long and then peel after a massive price drop. I doubt the owner was scared of BTC dropping further. What would get me to peel mine would be a massive bubble where I was afraid the price would drop before I could find a buyer.

Well, someone recently done just that with x6 series 2 Cas 25s....in the same block!
https://casasciustracker.com/?sort=10&flt0_balance_equals=0&flt1_type_equals=S2-COIN-25&page_size=100&desc=1

I imagine most of these will just get peeled by the owners... no one wants to take a loss be it fiat or crypto

The coin is a first-day second-batch funded 2011 coin with an S1 hologram

There are a few spots on the upper rim of the inner circle and a small spot below the address, can see in the 2nd picture

From the buyer's perspective, I get it. But from the seller's perspective, it doesn't make sense to sell under face value, unless he knows it's been tampered with. And in that case, it makes no sense at all for the buyer to buy it. Long term, I wouldn't be surprised if loaded collectibles can't be sold anymore. There's no reason for the buyer to trust it if the seller accepts less than the loaded value, and there's no reason for a honest owner to accept less than the loaded value.

   Here is a beautiful 1840 Penny Black stamp postally used in 1840!  Still strong vibrant black ink..I am sure when they made these stamps
183 years ago they didn't think of them lasting this long and used any paper or ink for such cases....but yet even though it went thru the postal system it is still in very good condition. The Penny Black was the very first postage stamp issued ever.

    I am sure todays ink and paper are much better than back then. 

   

https://www.ebay.com/itm/175864831526?hash=item28f25c5e26:g:9lcAAOSwyE5iKfXM&amdata=enc%3AAQAIAAAAwLYKpEJC2WbbY9e76kLB7I6sPiTqmwTG9M3xIT%2F2b12RgiAh6MiQnhZFOvQMURci31gIu%2FG2bDdMhjVjx6rXWZ82Knsm9ncdmGK9jI%2BAg5IHpMa5HJvu2pPuQerd0QiR%2F6RvNvH%2BAnYKEi09uXSYss5dDG3pl96%2FY7VGzcHiJ%2Bqf1uRiyOfp79kNrm1XRNjTlV%2BV%2Bn8SwyAyBSsIsVDTfdeCSCt0X1RrzV7uITwX%2F34TGNxkJicgb91%2FdagQyPvY2g%3D%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR8iakf3CYg

     

This is a great point about stamps lasting for so long. I'd like to add the few Cas and BTCC items I peeled not one of them had any issues whatsoever with me redeeming. Everything was beautifully intact and easy to read/redeem. 

iBHK8

  Thanks for sharing...another thing I forgot to mention about my 100 plus year old stamps....is that these stamps also have a sticky substance on the back we call the gum...SO imagine having this gum that when wet allows the stamps to stick to envelopes on the stamp paper, and even then they are in pristine condition....also stamps that were use thru the postage system on envelopes are still intact as well.

   Under the hologram is like encapsulating your paper away from the elements and the light....even better!

    I also see down the line, the BTC from Cas coins and Bitbills...2011 era will itself be a collectable BITCOIN separating itself from the later Bitcoins mined.

   So please keep on peeling them cas coins ye all...makes mine rarer.
    

Would love to hear more about the specifics of this coin- what type of degradation, etc?

Speaking from personal experience, I have had hundreds of Casascius coins pass through and every redeemed one/DEMO coin have never shown any degradation in terms of the private key
Adding to that, I have only ever seen one instance of a Casascius hologram having some sort of degradation... but I imagine this is due to the extensive transfer of it via shipping and storage at different humidity and temperature levels

  Has there ever been a Casascius with an unreadable private key? I know the earlier private keys are alphanumeric format...so those would not worry me too much compared to a qr code.

   Also with the private key being under the hologram, the paper and ink are protected from any exposure to humidity and light....especially light since that would fade away ink over time. I have stamps that are over a 100 years old and still in great shape. Especially of stored in an environment with low humidity and no light.

   

I couldn't agree more with this sentiment. I've done extensive research on this very topic having discussed it with many people and the more time goes on the more it proves true that the higher value the item the less risk others are willing to take and rightfully so. I truly understand both sides having been on both sides and there's little to zero chance I'd buy or expect to sell anything above 1BTC in a physical item these days. Take that for what it's worth it's just my 2 sats.

iBHK8

I hear you, but most likely it would have been more expensive from a private buyer, assuming seller is looking for a 20% premium (IMHO, not unreasonable for such a rare coin) and private buyer is charging 3% commission.  In addition, shipping and risks haven't been taken into account in this scenario for which Stacks and Bowers would be on the hook.

$32k buyers fee     Think I would just find a private buyer 

A long held, but controversial, opinion of mine is that we will see the high load value coins (like the Cas 25 or even 10) trade at less than face value at some point.  There are risks such as a private key being illegible over time, the hologram has been tampered with, etc which will be priced in as the USD value of the coins increase. 

Disappointing to see the 10 BTC go for the loaded value. Probably not the best timing given the sentiment around BTC and the broader financial markets.

I think that's most notable with this auction- more people coming in with interest toward the "collector" category which is the sub-1k coins, with 1-3k being a notch higher.

If anyone is interested in selling there, PM me. 

What is everyone’s thought on the private reserve Lealana coins that had Red Firstbits, the crypto encyclopedia only talks about green and black dresses. How common are these red ones has anyone ever seen them before for sale or have there ever been red addresses for sale on bitcoin talk ?   Thank you for your insight in advance

Edit :

Reference : https://auctions.stacksbowers.com/lots/view/3-13WTUX/unfunded-pattern-2013-lealana-025-bitcoin-firstbits-1jraljtd-serial-no-138-gold-hologram-red-address-silver-proof-70-deep-cameo-

It sold for 260k then add the 20% SB takes. So for everything you see on the sales page minus 20% for the actual sale price. Lower denominations did quite well.


iBHK8

Sold price of $312k, seems decent, except when you consider we're likely one good bull run away from this being a $ million coin.

Yeah that was cool to see. Even the alpen coin went for like 400 bucks I think.

Is anyone else surprised by the prices of some of the lower denomination loaded coins? Seems like these sold for much higher this time than previous S&B auctions - for example the Satori chips

It says 312k? Or is that with all costs included.

So the 10BTC coin went for 260K on S&B tonight?  I mean, yeah it's higher than load but it started at 250K.... Only one bid I think?

Then the 1 BTC Cas coins went for soooo much more than face lol...  S&B FTW, fuck GreatCollections unless you wanna flip I guess?

Edit - strangely, it's not much different on the above auction, but then again, the timeframes I did not take into account

   I gotta agree....Stacks and Bowers gets much better prices than greatcollections!

     
   Actually it went for less than load value unless you calculated the buyers fees from the auction.

Very interesting and exciting to see this hit the auction block. I wouldn’t be surprised to see this sold for over $400K, as that’s what it would take to get one of mine currently. Hoping it’ll set off a bidding war that will surpass my expectations but you never know. Maybe people won’t want to scale the premium and we’ll see it sold for just over 10 BTC. Either way, I’m curious.

I've been watching this site for quite a while, much longer than S&B, and I think most crypto stuff goes for much less of a premium there. No idea why, maybe those folks are not as educated, or what....  Just my observations based on past auctions I recall watching I guess, IDK.. 🤷‍♂️

You always have the risk the QR somehow can't claim the BTC. History has shown that you cannot set it to 0. Agree for Casascius close to 0 but still.
I will say 1 BTC on a coin not equal to 1 BTC in a wallet you control.
If you are very rich, you can better ignore that risk. But if I were to buy 10 BTC coin, it is not a risk I could ignore. So would not pay load.

This went recently for loaded value only.....  https://www.greatcollections.com/Coin/1367702/2012-10-BTC-Casascius-Bitcoin-Silver-Coin-PCGS-SP-69

good catch- yes, the bid price is for the whole coin including load value, which makes the 250k technically uninteresting beyond being a milestone for an actual $ amount bid on a "Bitcoin" which will grab the attention of collectors unfamiliar with these. The "real" auction is this Friday, and the reserve price will ensure that it can't sell below the load value. Previously they've been doing 2-3x load for silvers, so popcorn's out.

now in these cases is the load value taken into consideration when looking at the value as the majority of the price may be directly linked to the loaded value instead of the numismatic value - I will be curious to see the amount over load that the coin gets and would almost consider that to be the coins "value" separate from the load value.

Looks like a 10 BTC coin is already pre-bidding at 250k on Stacks, set to go into live bidding on Friday which should be exciting to watch over YouTube.

https://auctions.stacksbowers.com/lots/view/3-13WSZN/2012-casascius-gold-b-10-bitcoin-loaded-firstbits-1agrpnvg-series-2-silver-specimen-68-pcgs

My thinking is that if this sells successfully, it will create some waves in the mainstream numismatics world because anything in the 6-figure range is serious business by practically any measure of the hobby, and its hard to dismiss a barely decade-old coin going for that type of sum. Bullish