Today, the current head of Binance, Richard Teng, brought up a major topic that many market participants have been speculating about for years. It is about the countries that own the main cryptocurrency, Bitcoin (BTC). Being a kind of analog of gold, which was also recently recognized by the head of U.S. Federal Reserve Board Jerome Powell, many crypto enthusiasts see BTC as an asset that should form a basket of strategic reserves.

With the imminent arrival of the new U.S. administration, such talk has become more frequent, and although there is no confirmation of its intentions yet, the market is already practicing a possible similar outcome quite powerfully, with Bitcoin gaining over 136% since the beginning of the year and already flashing a six-figure price figure.

In the midst of all this, Teng decided to ask his audience what other countries could potentially have a strategic reserve in cryptocurrency.

Bitcoin and governments

Although there is no precedent for such a thing, a number of countries already have Bitcoin savings, although not all in the traditional way. For example, the same United States is known to hold 198,109 BTC on its balance sheet, which is the equivalent of $19.25 billion right now.

In addition, according to Arkham, we know about another $500 million of various cryptocurrencies in the wallets of the U.S. government. For the most part, all of these assets have been seized as a result of various criminal cases, such as the Silk Road shutdown or the Bitfinex hack in 2016.

However, there are also the examples of Bhutan and El Salvador, which own 11,688 BTC, equivalent to $1.14 billion, and 5,960 BTC, equivalent to $579.25 million, respectively. The savings of these countries came from mining and buying Bitcoin on the market.

Financial analyst, trader and crypto enthusiast.

Gamza graduated with a degree in finance and credit with a specialization in securities and financial derivatives. He then also completed a master's program in banking and asset management.

He wants to have a hand in covering economic and fintech topics, as well as educate more people about cryptocurrencies and blockchain.