Government Crypto HoldingsChainCensus · Government Crypto Holdings
12 countries · reviewed 2026-07-16~407,707BTC documented
18,000BTC owned outright
12countries tracked
Who holds the mostBTC · excl. stolen, sold & disputed
United States~328,372
United Kingdom61,245
El Salvador7,713
United Arab Emirates~6,333
Bhutan3,954
Finland90
chaincensus.com/government-holdings~ = estimated · documented cases only
13 results · BTC first, by amount
| Country | Amount ▾ | Origin | Status | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States#U.S. government — USMS/DOJ custody + Strategic Bitcoin Reserve | ~328,372 BTC | Seizure | Holding | Seized BTC (Silk Road, Bitfinex-hack recovery, and the record 127,271 BTC Chen Zhi forfeiture) consolidated under a March 2025 executive order into a Strategic Bitcoin Reserve. No official audit exists — the total is a tracker estimate and part is pending final forfeiture. ↗ |
| United Kingdom#Home Office / Met Police — Qian Zhimin (Lantian Gerui) seizure | 61,245 BTC | Seizure | Holding | 61,245 BTC seized in the Qian Zhimin investment-fraud case (~128,000 victims in China). Ownership is unresolved: civil recovery under POCA is ongoing, much of the sum may be returned to victims, and the government seeks to retain a share. ↗ |
| North Korea#Lazarus Group (state-sponsored) — stolen funds, actively laundered | ~13,518 BTC | Theft | Holding | Stolen, not a reserve: proceeds of exchange and bridge hacks attributed to the Lazarus Group, actively laundered — balances change weekly. Cumulative thefts since 2017 are ~$6.75B; $2.02B was stolen in 2025 alone. Arkham-attributed BTC ≈ 13,500. ↗ |
| El Salvador#National treasury (public wallet) | 7,713 BTC | Purchase | Holding | Treasury purchases since 2021, publicly tracked on-chain. Under the December 2024 IMF program the public sector agreed to stop buying; the reserve has still grown — the IMF attributes the growth to wallet consolidation rather than new purchases. ↗ |
| United Arab Emirates#Citadel Mining / Royal Group-linked (Arkham attribution) | ~6,333 BTC | State mining | Holding | State-overseen mining attributed on-chain by Arkham (~6,300–6,800 BTC including Royal Group wallets). No official disclosure exists, so the exact government-vs-Royal-Group perimeter is an estimate. ↗ |
| Bhutan#Druk Holding & Investments (sovereign fund) | 3,954 BTC | State mining | Partially sold | Hydropower state mining since ~2019 via Druk Holding. Peak ~13,000 BTC in October 2024; ~70% sold over 18 months per Arkham attribution, with proceeds partly earmarked for the Gelephu Mindfulness City project. Mining inflows appear to have stopped. Most trackers still show stale, higher figures. ↗ |
| Finland#Finnish Customs (Tulli) | 90 BTC | Seizure | Partially sold | 1,981 BTC seized, mostly in a 2016 dark-web drug case. Customs sold 1,889 BTC for €46.5M in summer 2022 and donated part of the proceeds to Ukraine; 90 BTC remain pending a final forfeiture judgment. ↗ |
| Germany#Saxony — Movie2k forfeiture | 0 BTC | Seizure | Sold | 49,858 BTC from the Movie2k piracy case were sold for ~€2.63B over June–July 2024 (avg ~$57,600). A further ~57,000 BTC identified on-chain may be surrendered to Saxony under a plea deal proposed in April 2026 — not yet final. ↗ |
| North Korea#Lazarus Group (state-sponsored) — stolen funds, actively laundered | ~13,702 ETH | Theft | Holding | Ether attributed to Lazarus-controlled addresses, largely from the February 2025 Bybit hack (~$1.46B in ETH); portions are continuously swapped to BTC and laundered through mixers and cross-chain bridges. ↗ |
| Bulgaria#Claimed 2017 seizure — best evidence says never held | 213,519 BTC | Seizure | Disputed | The famous 213,519 BTC from a 2017 customs-fraud case was a press extrapolation. Prosecutors stated in 2022 that no such coins were ever confiscated or held, and no evidence of custody or sale has ever been produced. Kept here as a documented debunk of a widely copied tracker figure. ↗ |
| China#PRC — PlusToken forfeiture (disposition unclear) | 190,000 BTC | Seizure | Disputed | ~194,000 BTC seized from the PlusToken Ponzi were ruled forfeited to the national treasury in 2020. Analysts believe the coins were sold via Huobi as early as 2019; trackers still list ~190,000 BTC. No on-chain or official evidence of current custody exists. ↗ |
| Venezuela#State holdings after Petro shutdown and mining ban | 240 BTC | Seizure | Disputed | Trackers list 240 BTC. A rumored 600,000 BTC shadow reserve (~$60B) following Maduro's 2026 arrest has no on-chain evidence per Chainalysis and Nansen. The state Petro token was shut down in January 2024; bitcoin mining was banned in May 2024. ↗ |
| Ukraine#No state reserve — tracker figure is officials' personal declarations | 0 BTC | Donation | Disputed | Trackers list 46,351 BTC for Ukraine, but that figure aggregates crypto declared personally by public officials — not a state treasury. The 2022 war-effort donations (~$100M in crypto) were received and spent. Bill 13356 would let the central bank hold crypto in reserves; it has not passed. ↗ |
Cite this data
Government Crypto Holdings: approximately 407,707 BTC documented across 12 countries. ChainCensus, cited 2 August 2026. chaincensus.com/government-holdings
Free to cite and screenshot with attribution. Full data via the API. Records change with reviews — the methodology page keeps a dated change log, so a quoted figure stays checkable.
Sourcing and inclusion criteria in the methodology →