Topic: US Marshalls auction SilkRoad bitcoins - page 3. (Read 5216 times)

Any ideas on WHO (or at least what TYPE) of buyer it will be?

This is the norm in how seized assets are sold.

The US Marshals takes possession of the assets, they make an announcement regarding the up coming auction along with the details of the auction, they hold the auction in a similar manor.

LOL! Imagine that to happen.
Knowing the feds, that actually could happen

would be funny if the FBI dude comes on here complaining he got scammed and wished he used escrow :p

Second Market is accepting bids for aggregation:
https://bitco.wufoo.com/forms/participate-in-us-marshals-bitcoin-auction/

I think it has something to do with the fact that the dollar is the world reserve currency.  But they can't keep piling on more debt forever.  Other countries are already starting to stop taking on new dollar debts.  China said something a few months back about that.  They don't want to just pull the rug out though cause that would make their holdings worthless if they completely crash the dollar, plus we buy a lot of their goods , so it's an interdepency but I think they are trying to wean themselves off the dollar.

It's easier to print money
I still don't get it how they can be one of the most powerful countries with such government.
Really makes no sense to me. Maybe it's because I haven't seen how they actuay function, but you can't be in such debt and doing nothing to actually get out of it.

And they have no reason to do so.  Just as they have no reason to speculate or invest in Apple stock or rare stamps.

Maybe, no one  can  guarantee

Looks as if we've had some insider trading in the past couple of days

You are correct, there are many plausible and logical ways for the US Government to  invest in bitcoins and keep the information of these moves public, but when has anyone ever known the US government to do things that were logical?

You're crazy. There are millions of better ways the government can speculate or invest into BTC.

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I was wondering the same exact thing myself, stealing ones wallet does not give you their coins, and a person who is notorious of Silk Road would not just makes things so easily accessible, I think what really happened here is as follows

The US Government bought all those coins when the bitcoins surge began, they have held them until a time appropriate for them to sell them, and needed a way to do so, offered Silk road a plea bargain to agree to their terms (that part is speculation) for silk road to say yes their coins were seized, they are now using this silk road situation to sell the coinsthey bought with taxpayers money without telling them the gamble they actually took with all the tax dollars.

Does this seem to wrong, maybe eveen on the lines of conspiracy, well think about this, 401K plans, what happened there, or even worse yet the stimulus packages, what most people dont understand is both of those situations were exactly the same HUGE gambles with tax payer dollars, buying stocks with your retirement, then loosing it all on your end while gaining like theives in the night on their end, they put your retirement into a market they colluded, and stacked against your own retirement and filled their pockets and the bankers pockets who raised the situation to congress in the first place

the stimulous packages were no different, companies got X amount of dollars in return those companies ahd to give X amount of stocks to be controlled by the US treasury, some worked out well others failed dramatically like all GM and GMC owned stocks failed and fell thru the floor loosing the US tax payers a lot of the money that was given in the stimulus packages.

It was nice to see tho, this bitcoin venture they invested in worked out for the best for them.

as i mentioned, they could have wealthy friends (i mean, come on, they are in the FBI) who could use a little insider info to make profits from buying these bitcoins cheap.

I hope they accidentally send them to the wrong address and they keep the winning bidders money. Here's how that conversation will go.

US Marshall Supervisor: Fred, I thought you told me you knew how to work that Bitcoin stuff.

Auctioneer: Yeah, I do. The FBI told me how to do it.

US Marshall Supervisor: Well, one of the winners is bitching that they didn't get the things. They say they tracked them in the blockhead to some guy named Mark Karpeles. Did you type in the code thingy right?

Auctioneer: Oops! Oh well, what are they gonna do sue us.

Background laughter heard from everyone in the room.

Yes, that's is the spirit.   ( A fellow government worker there?   )

Although the dialogue may have been more like:

FBI: We got some seized bitcoins cleared for auction.  You guys know how to handle that stuff?
USMS: Yes, no problem, the auction could not be any easier. Just send the coins, I'll email the address.
FBI: Good! Thanks, bye.

That is probably pretty close to what happened.  Those FBI agents don't get a fee, they will get paid the same amount whether it sells high or low.  Like many government employees (actually like most people), they just want to do the least amount of work possible. 

FBI guy:  How are we going to get rid of these things.
USMS guy:  How about 10 lots of 3,000 each, highest bidder, silent auction?  That will be the least amount of work for us.
FBI guy:  Sounds good.

No more for bitcoin than for any other merchanise.  It is not part of their mission to make a profit from sales of seized stuff.

Why do people think that the FBI views seized bitcoins any different from seized cash, gold, stocks, etc?

is it me or does it look like the FBI wants to give their friends coins on the cheap? it's like they're not going to even try to get the most out of the bitcoins they own.. and are they going to disclose who buys them at what price, or is that private?