Analyst Jiang Jinze mentioned several ways the U.S. could purchase Bitcoin for its strategic reserve in the event it runs out of seized BTC.
Analyst and Muse Labs founder Jiang Jinze has pointed out that there is a possibility the U.S. would still need to acquire more Bitcoin (BTC) moving forward. According to him, only 100,000 BTC out of the total owned by U.S. government can be considered “real reserves.” This is because nearly 50% of the confiscated BTC must be returned to Bitfinex.
In January 2025, the U.S. federal court ruled that 94,643 of 119,754 BTC stolen in the 2016 Bitfinex hack must be returned to the exchange. The BTC is currently held by the U.S. government after it was seized by authorities.
“In addition, most of these were confiscated in the early days when Bitcoin was worthless. It may take a long time to confiscate the same amount of coins in the future,” said Jinze in a translated post.
Therefore, the analyst and Muse Labs founder has offered up a few alternatives that would enable the Trump administration to buy more Bitcoin without using taxpayer funds.
First, he suggests selling gold to increase the U.S. government’s BTC holdings. The two assets have long been linked together, especially after the Bitcoin reserve announcement when the price of both assets fell around the same time, Jinze noted.
Aside from gold, the government could also sell other kinds of assets such as land, buildings, licenses and others. However, he also acknowledged that the federal government has a limited amount of assets they could sell to buy BTC.
“Redistribution of existing assets This is currently the most likely source of incremental funds, using the income generated by gold reserves or Fed deposits to finance the purchase of Bitcoin,” said Jinze.
Another path the U.S. government could pursue is taking advantage of existing underutilized computing resources or energy to mine their own Bitcoin and increase reserves. Jinze mentions Bhutan as an example of a country that accumulates government-owned BTC through state-supported crypto mining.
After the White House Crypto Summit on March 7, AI and crypto czar David Sacks said the U.S. government will not use government funds to purchase BTC for its strategic reserve, instead opting to use seized assets already owned by the government. He claimed the U.S. government owns around 200,000 BTC, though it has not been audited.
