- 33.7 Bitcoin (BTC) worth over $3 million was moved from Silk Road-related wallets after almost five years of inactivity.
- The consolidated BTC was transferred to a Coinbase Prime deposit address following 176 transactions.
- These BTC addresses have not seen outgoing transactions since February 2021 before the recent activity.
- Approximately 416 BTC, valued at $37.5 million, still remain in the Silk Road-related wallets.
- Ownership of the transfers remains unknown, with speculation ranging from former agents to other involved parties.
After nearly five years with no outgoing movement, a total of 33.7 bitcoin (BTC), valued at over $3 million, has been transferred from wallets connected to the darknet marketplace Silk Road. The activity involved 176 individual transactions, consolidating smaller amounts from multiple Silk Road-linked addresses into a single wallet before moving the entire sum to a Coinbase Prime deposit address.
The transactions were first highlighted by the X user DarkWebInformer, who referenced a set of Silk Road-associated addresses listed on the blockchain explorer Arkham. Within 24 hours of the last consolidation transfer, the funds were routed through an intermediate address and then sent to an address marked as “Coinbase Prime Deposit.” Prior to these movements, the last outgoing transaction from these wallets dated back to February 2, 2021.
Currently, about 416 BTC, worth approximately $37.5 million, remain in the associated addresses. These wallets originate from older BTC addresses starting with the number one, reflecting their legacy status from the Silk Road period. Their transaction history shows activity before being transferred into seizure wallets over a decade ago, with the recent transfers involving residual “dust,” or very small leftover amounts.
Silk Road operated as a darknet marketplace mainly for drug sales from 2011 to 2013, with transactions in BTC. It was shut down following the arrest of its founder, Ross Ulbricht. Around 144,336 BTC related to Silk Road were seized and sold in 2017 for $48 million; today, that amount would be worth about $13 billion. Additional BTC seizures connected to Silk Road occurred in November 2020 and November 2021, valued at over $1 billion and $3 billion, respectively.
In 2023, James “Jimmy” Zhong admitted guilt for stealing funds from the marketplace in 2012. Two former federal agents were also charged for misappropriating digital assets during their Silk Road investigation. Ulbricht was granted a presidential pardon in January after nearly a decade of imprisonment.
Who exactly made the recent transfers is unknown. Speculation on X includes theories such as a retiring FBI agent or Mark Karpeles, the ex-operator of Mt Gox and alleged real Silk Road owner. Arkham separately labels several entities in the Silk Road ecosystem, including “US Government: Silk Road DOJ Confiscated Funds,” “US Government: Ross Ulbricht Confiscated Funds,” “James Zhong,” and “Silk Road Hacker,” but no definitive identification of the transfer source has been confirmed.
For more details on the accounts involved, visit the Silk Road bundle and related addresses on the Arkham blockchain explorer.
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