An announcement regarding the long-awaited U.S. Strategic Bitcoin Reserve (SBR) will be made “in the coming weeks,” Patrick Witt, executive director of the President’s Council of Advisors on Digital Assets, said Wednesday at CoinDesk’s Miami Consensus conference.
The federal effort to inventory, centralize and secure bitcoins held in the United States and other digital assets have been running in the background for months, Witt said. Following President Donald Trump’s executive order calling for bitcoin and other crypto assets to be set aside as long-term holdings, the White House ended what Witt called “fire sale” liquidations under the previous administration and began auditing the cryptocurrencies held by each agency.
“We have heard stories and confirmed some about cold wallets that were stored in desk drawers at various agencies,” he said.
Witt cited a recent exploit involving assets held by the U.S. Marshals Service as motivating evidence in favor of centralization. Bloomberg reported in January that the Marshals Service was investigating a possible hack of the U.S. government’s digital asset accounts, after on-chain investigator ZachXBT claimed a hacker stole more than $60 million in late 2025, including funds from government-seized wallets.
“This is a good example of why it was so necessary for the president to create the SBR and instruct the agencies to take these assets very seriously and protect them properly,” Witt said. “Custody is unique for digital assets.”
Witt declined to disclose the amount of bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies currently held by the federal government.
“First, we want to get our own house in order. We want to protect and properly preserve these assets before we discuss the details of this,” he said. He suggested the upcoming announcement would answer some of the open questions about size and structure, but said he didn’t want to “get ahead of other executives involved.”
He also clarified that the reserve will not automatically absorb all newly seized assets. Crypto seized in active legal proceedings remains on hold until forfeiture is finalized, he said, with assets potentially returned to victims through restitution before being moved to the Bitcoin reserve or separate stockpile provided for other crypto assets.
Regarding the legal underpinnings, Witt said much of the staff work has been devoted to questions at the attorney general level about who authorizes agencies to hold the assets, for how long and whether they are subject to congressional clawback.
“It hadn’t really been explored until the president signed the executive order,” he said.
Codification will have to go through Congress, Witt said, citing Sen. Cynthia Lummis’ BITCOIN Act in the Senate and Rep. Nick Begich’s American Reserves Modernization Act, a renamed update of the same bill in the U.S. House of Representatives.
“This must always be followed by appropriate legislation,” Witt said.
The likely need for a legislative framework for the establishment of the Bitcoin reserve has been a major constraint in this process. It’s unclear when Congress will find the bandwidth and will to pass a reservation bill.
