Bitcoin (BTC) is breaking records. More than five years ago now, some experts predicted that the $100,000 mark would be reached. A few days ago, the scenario became reality. The price of BTC reached a new all-time high of over $107,000.
Who owns how many bitcoins and how are states involved in the cryptocurrency market? “The Luxembourg state is not involved in bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies and does not invest in them either,” said CSV Ministers of Finance, Gilles Roth, and Justice, Elisabeth Margue, in response to a parliamentary question.
According to the Blocktrainer.de platform, Germany sold around 49,858 BTC in the summer of 2024. They had been seized as part of criminal proceedings against the streaming platform movie2k. According to Luxembourg ministers, the Caisse de consignation has been accepting the registration of bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies for a year. Currently, only the State Assets Administration (BGA) uses it.
A cryptocurrency wallet
The State Property Administration has so far pledged and held the following cryptocurrencies (all figures have been rounded).
“The pledged cryptocurrencies do not belong to the state, but are only kept by the BGA until the courts have decided whether they should be returned or confiscated,” said Mr. Roth and Ms. Margue.
During the year 2024, BGA sold 0.02877164 seized BTC for 1,554.04 euros. “The sum was donated to the Fund for Combating Certain Forms of Crime.” Recently, 4.5274 seized BTC were also sold for 401,502.32 euros and the sum is kept by the Caisse de consignation.
To the Pirates’ parliamentary question on the amount of cryptocurrencies sold in recent years in Luxembourg and returned to the state coffers through taxes, the government responded that it could not publish information on this subject. The reason for this situation probably lies in the anonymous management of cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrencies are generally purchased on specialized exchange platforms and sent to “wallets” for safe custody.
Physically, cryptocurrency does not exist in the “wallet”. The “key” of the cryptographic address in the “wallet” only “reserves” the desired and purchased number of cryptocurrencies on the blockchain. Since blockchain is based on a decentralized system and wallet addresses are used completely anonymously, it is virtually impossible to directly assign addresses to companies or individuals. This would only be possible by indirect means.
In the case of movie2k, tracing would only be possible if the company made its cryptographic address public in order to receive subscription payments or donations in cryptocurrency. Since cryptocurrency exchanges generally require verified registration – to buy or sell cryptocurrencies – investigators can identify perpetrators on the exchanges at the latest in the event of successful transaction tracing.
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