The South Korean government is mulling over how to cash out the cryptocurrency it recently confiscated. While the most likely option is to auction the coins off using the government-owned auction platform, various concerns have been raised.
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Cashing Out BTC
The South Korean government is contemplating how to best cash out its recently-acquired cryptocurrency. As part of a criminal case, the government has seized 191.32333418 BTC belonging to “Ahn,” the convicted operator of a porn site. The country’s Supreme Court recently judged that cryptocurrency is a property that the government can confiscate.
“The prosecutor is facing a decision of how to dispose of the BTC and give the proceeds to the treasury,” Yonhap reported, elaborating:
The most likely option would be auctioning off through the asset disposal system of the Korea Asset Management Corporation (KAMCO), ‘Onbid’.
KAMCO is South Korea’s government-owned asset management company that manages Onbid, a system which facilitates the online trading of property owned by public-sector entities. The platform has been used to sell other items confiscated by the government such as securities. “Securities auctions have been actively conducted on Onbid,” Etoday noted.
BTC’s Price Fluctuation Is a Problem
According to Yonhap, “the prosecutor’s biggest concern is the price fluctuation of bitcoin.” The price of BTC reached over 25 million won on January 7 but has now dropped to 8.3 million won, according to data from Bithumb, one of the largest crypto exchanges in the country.
“Onbid sets the date of public announcement, the date of public sale, and the lowest price. However, because of price volatility, the [price of] bitcoin may be larger between the announcement date and the bid date,” the news outlet
