U.S. government cryptocurrency wallet moves nearly $1 billion in Bitcoin seized from Bitfinex hackersBitcoin wallets seized by the U.S. government in the infamous Bitfinex hack, an incident that later led to Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather "Razzlekhan" Morgan pleading guilty, suddenly became active.In less than two hours, nearly $1 billion in wallets tagged in connection with the case had been transferred to unknown addresses in four transactions.The motivation or purpose of the transactions is unclear; the U.S. government did not immediately respond to CoinDesk’s request for comment.Two cryptocurrency wallets that were flagged as holding funds seized by the U.S. government in connection with the infamous Bitfinex hack have just transferred nearly $1 billion in Bitcoin to unknown addresses.A wallet that was one of at least three flagged by blockchain data firm Arkham Intelligence as holding Bitfinex hack funds seized by the U.S. government initially moved 1 at around 18:39 UTC (1:39 p.m. ET) Bitcoin. About half an hour later, the remaining 2,817 bitcoins in the wallet were sent, emptying the wallet. In total, these Bitcoins are worth approximately $173 million.Shortly thereafter, another wallet, containing approximately 12,300 Bitcoins, transferred 0.01 Bitcoin to another unknown address and subsequently sent the remaining Bitcoins, according to Arkham. These transfers represent a value of approximately $750 million, with the total value of Bitcoin that will be transferred from these two wallets being approximately $923 million, based on the current price of the leading cryptocurrency.The motivation for these transfers is unclear. The U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to questions sent via a media request website.In what has been a volatile trading day for cryptocurrencies, the price of Bitcoin first reached $60,000 before rising further to over $64,000 before suddenly plummeting to just over $59,000. At press time, the price of Bitcoin was just over $60,000. The highest price set at the end of 2021 was approximately $69,000.According to Arkham, there is another U.S. government wallet holding about 94,600 bitcoins of seized Bitfinex hacker funds, worth about $5.79 billion at current prices.The Bitfinex hack is one of the crypto industry's most notorious thefts, and was caused in part by Heather "Razzlekhan" Morgan's colorful social media posts. She and Ilya Lichtenstein were charged in the case.According to a Justice Department press release in August, the government seized approximately 95,000 stolen Bitcoins, worth approximately $3.6 billion at the time, from cryptocurrency wallets controlled by the defendants.
