Silk Road Bitcoins Found: Value Increased by 1,000 Times

The bitcoins discovered allegedly belonged to Ross Ulbricht, the administrator of the site freed by Trump, and were not confiscated by intelligence agencies.

The Chief Product Officer of Coinbase, Conor Grogan, said he had discovered about 430 bitcoins in dozens of wallets allegedly associated with or belonging to Ross Ulbricht. Ross Ulbricht is the founder of the darknet site Silk Road, which was pardoned by Donald Trump on 22 January. At the 22 January exchange rate, these bitcoins are worth about $47 million.

In 2013, Silk Road was shut down by US intelligence agencies. Ulbricht was arrested and charged with drug trafficking, money laundering and setting up a criminal organisation. In February 2015, he was sentenced to two life sentences and an additional 40 years in prison.

According to Grogan, the bitcoins he discovered were not confiscated by the intelligence agencies when Silk Road was shut down and remained intact throughout Ulbricht's prison term or longer (up to 13 years). In his view, the wallets contained remnants of funds that had almost no value at the time.

When Silk Road was shut down, in October 2013, the value of bitcoin was around $120-130. Therefore, the current value of the remaining bitcoins has increased by almost 1,000 times.

Grogan clarified that he will not publish the addresses of the wallets, but stated that these are public (mentioned in court materials or directly linked to those used by Silk Road or by Ulbricht personally) and that they are already being monitored by many researchers.

Grogan also pointed out that it is not certain whether Ulbricht has maintained access to these wallets. At the time of publication, all the coins are still intact.

Trump’s Ulbricht Pledge & BTC Community

In May 2024, Trump promised to liberate Ulbricht if he was re-elected. In late October, he called on Bitcoin supporters to vote for him in the presidential election and again reiterated his plans to free Ulbricht, accompanying a social media post with the hashtag #FreeRossDayOne.

Many Bitcoin enthusiasts considered Ulbricht's life sentence excessive and unjust. Since his incarceration, a petition asking for his pardon on the specially created website freeross.org has gathered more than 600 thousand signatures.

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