An unknown user withdrew 69,370 BTC from a wallet that hackers have been trying to hack for several years. At the time of writing, the recipient address is the fourth largest holder of bitcoin in the world.
https://twitter.com/whale_alert/status/1323740996295925764?s=20
- whale_alert
The withdrawal was carried out in two transactions - for 1 BTC and for 69,369 BTC (approximately $ 960 million at the time of writing). Later, 69,370 BCH were also withdrawn.
Previously, the wallet.dat file was sold on several hacking forums, although there is still no guarantee that it contained bitcoins. Perhaps the wallet owner simply transferred the coins to a secure address.
Bitcoin Core contributor Matt Worth noted five hours before the transfer that the likelihood of correctly guessing the private key is negligible.
https://twitter.com/CoinCornerMatt/status/1323671543403155457?s=20
- CoinCornerMatt
As noted by the Telegram channel Goldfoundinshit, the forums claimed that the wallet is associated with the founder of Silk Road Ross Ulbricht, who is serving a life sentence in an American prison.
WhaleBot Alerts highlighted that the wallet could be linked to the collapsed Mt.Gox exchange.
https://t.me/whalebotalerts/60445
Update: Analyst firm Elliptic found out that on May 6, 2012, these coins left the Silk Road wallet. Then the recipient's address remained dormant for almost a year, after which they were transferred to the wallet, where they remained until November 3, 2020. Only in 2015, 101 BTC was sent from the address to the BTC-e exchange, which was subsequently closed by American law enforcement officers as part of an investigation into a large-scale money laundering scheme.
https://twitter.com/elliptic/status/1323823974934056960?s=20
- elliptic
Silk Road is believed to have earned 614,000 BTC in fees, although only 174,000 BTC was seized from founder Ross Ulbricht upon arrest. Ulbricht sold at least part of the remaining coins to cover operating expenses, according to Elliptic. This means that the Silk Road coins are in circulation.