Bloomberg: Over $75 billion in Crypto Assets related to illegal activities could be confiscated by governments as reserves.

PANews, October 9 - According to Bloomberg, U.S. President Trump is leading a global push to establish strategic cryptocurrency reserves using assets seized from criminals. Research by Chainalysis Inc. shows that cryptocurrency assets related to illegal activities and accessible to law enforcement on-chain have exceeded $75 billion. Its CEO, Jonathan Levin, stated that this enhances the potential for asset seizure and changes the views of various countries. Chainalysis found that the on-chain balance of illegal entities is nearly $15 billion by 2025, with downstream wallets (holding at least 10% of funds from crime) containing over $60 billion. Cryptocurrency controlled by dark web market managers and suppliers exceeds $40 billion, with $15 billion directly held by illegal actors, of which Bitcoin accounts for about 75%. Together with Ether and stablecoins, this has surged by 359% compared to five years ago. Downstream wallets are similar, with dark web-related wallets showing a compound annual growth rate of over 200%. However, whether authorities can access this $75 billion remains questionable. Despite significant increases in law enforcement efforts against cryptocurrency crimes in recent years, the skills, international cooperation, and funding needed to identify, track, and seize criminals' digital assets continue to pose a challenge.