Concerns about high price volatility prompted prosecutors in Germany to make an emergency sale of seized cryptos worth more than 12 million euros (about $14 million).
Der Tagesspiegel reported on Monday that Bavarian prosecutors had ordered the sale on 20 February. Bitcoin prices had rebounded to nearly $10,000 after falling to $5,947 on February 6, according to CoinDesk's Bitcoin Price Index.
Taking nearly two months to complete, the sale would have sold 1,312 bitcoins, 1,399 bitcoin cash, 1,312 bitcoin gold and 220 ether via over 1,600 transactions on a German trading platform.
The crypto-currencies were all seized during two investigations conducted by Bavarian cybercrime agencies. Although the prosecutor has not yet filed a complaint in both cases, German law allows emergency sales if assets seized in ongoing investigations face an immediate threat of impairment, according to the report.
"As all crypto-currencies are exposed to the risk of sharp price fluctuations or even total loss, the Bayern Central Bureau of Cybercrime has ordered an emergency sale," prosecutors explained in the report.
Following the sale, the office has not yet determined how to manage the product, as it is still unclear whether the prosecutor will move forward with investigations.
At the end of last year, the Central Office for Cybercrime in the German state of Hesse also made a notorious sale of 126 Bitcoins confiscated for several years following investigations into the darknet. At the time, the price of Bitcoin was around $20,000, which represented nearly $2.3 million, according to an earlier Der Tagesspiegel report.