Following the capture of Nicolás Maduro by the United States over the weekend, a report was released claiming that Venezuela had $60 billion stored in Bitcoin, leading to speculation that the United States could lay claim to the cryptocurrency as well as the oil. Despite numerous reports of Venezuela’s massive Bitcoin reserve, one legal crypto company is skeptical of the claims.
News of Venezuela’s Bitcoin holdings began to surface last Saturday, the same day Maduro was ousted. Digital publishing Brazen Project reported that his regime could control $60 billion in original cryptocurrency, but offered little evidence.
“The article does not list any addresses as a starting point, making it difficult to verify these speculative claims,” Aurélie Barthere, senior research analyst at Nansen, said of the Brazen Project report.
Barthere is not the first person to express skepticism about the country’s alleged crypto treasure trove. Mauricio di Bartolomeo, Venezuelan co-founder of financial services company Ledn, said Fortune As of Wednesday, the country’s level of corruption makes that figure hard to believe. He developed his argument in an opinion piece for which he wrote Coin Office.
Estimates of Venezuela’s crypto holdings vary wildly. Bitcointreasuries.net estimates that the country owns $22 million worth of Bitcoin. This figure would make Venezuela the ninth government entity with the most money tied up in the original cryptocurrency, just behind North Korea.
Although the exact size of Venezuela’s Bitcoin wealth is unclear, the country has long been a crypto player. Maduro introduced a token called Petro in 2018, which was shut down six years later. Its citizens have also turned to stablecoins to combat hyperinflation of their currency.
Trump has said he would “run” Venezuela, and some have speculated that this would include seizing the country’s Bitcoin holdings. Andrew Fierman, head of national security intelligence at Chainalysis, said he could not comment on the likelihood of such a seizure. He did, however, explain what taking control of the assets could look like.
An asset freeze could take place via centralized services, he said. These services would obtain a court order for an exchange or issuer like Tether or Circle that could blacklist an address. The second method is to resort to physical entry. The United States could take control of wallets, devices and keys through forced cooperation.
For now, it is unlikely that there will be a full and accurate accounting of Venezuela’s Bitcoin holdings until the country’s political situation becomes more stable.
