The auction will take place on December 4

Nov 18, 2014 09:11 GMT  ·  By

The trove of bitcoins US authorities seized from Silk Road last year is going up for auction again.

The US Marshals Service announced that it would be auctioning 50,000 bitcoins, which are worth around $20 million (€16 million) at the current rate. This is the second round of auctions for the bunch of bitcoins seized during the Silk Road takedown, following a session in June.

Then, the Marshals Service sold 29,656 bitcoins, which were split in several blocks of Bitcoins for easier selling. That turned out to be unnecessary after the same individual bought the whole bunch. Tim Draper, prominent Silicon Valley investor, was later identified as the winning bidder for the entire lot.

The bitcoins in the latest auction are part of the same batch that came from the digital wallets residing on computers belonging to Ross Ulbricht, the alleged mastermind behind the online drug market that was shut down in October 2014. Ulbricht agreed back in January that the US government could sell the bitcoins, which is how the auctions came to be.

This time around, the auction will be split into two rounds, considering the size of the pack. The first group will be formed of 10 blocks of 2,000 bitcoins, while the second will have another 10 blocks of 3,000 bitcoins.

Registration process

Just as the last time, bidders have to preregister and make deposits of $100,000. They’ll have a six-hour window on December 4 to submit sealed bids on rounds for which they have registered to bid. They’ll also have to disclose their identity, as well as any connection they may have to the Silk Road mastermind.

Registration began on Monday, and will end on December 1, which means prospective buyers have two weeks to sign up. It should be interesting to see whether the whole bunch will go to the same buyer again or if we have more names on the list this time around.

Hopefully, this time around, there won’t be another situation like in the first auction round, where the Marshals Service, which had promised to keep the identities of bidders and winners alike secret, leaked the names of more than a dozen people who were interested in bidding in the auction. Then, it was obvious that sending a BCC email to interested bidders was a complete mystery to the US Marshals Service, which put all the addresses in the CC line instead.

Photo Gallery (5 Images)

Ulbricht's bitcoins are getting auctioned off
An extra 50,000 bitcoins are getting soldAfter the nearly 30,000 coins sold in June
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