The United States government announced on Thursday that it will sell the bitcoins it seized last year from Silk Road a notorious online marketplace for drugs and hitmen, in a 12-hour auction on July 27.
The auction will be conducted by the U.S. Marshals Service, and will require would-be bidders to register by June 23 and to make a refundable $200,000 wire transfer to a government bank.
News of the auction has been bubbling on Reddit all day, where readers pointed to transfers on the blockchain, which records the currency's movements, to suggest that Uncle Sam was getting set to unload bitcoins once owned by the owner of Silk Road owner, who is best known as Dread Pirate Roberts.
The auction will be conducted by selling nine blocks of 3000 bitcoins, and then a separate auction of 2,657 bitcoins.
Bitcoins are currently valued at around $650 apiece so the auction, which is being conducted under criminal forfeiture laws, could net the U.S. government around $20 million.