Bitcoins
- Druk Holding and Investments transferred 175 BTC worth approximately US$11.85 million on March 10, bringing Bhutan’s total 2026 bitcoin sales to roughly US$42.5 million across BTC and USDT transactions.
- Bhutan’s holdings have dropped from approximately 13,000 BTC at their late-2024 peak to about 5,400 BTC, a 58% decline conducted without public explanation through institutional counterparties.
- Blockchain analytics platform Arkham characterised the selling pattern as periodic clips of US$5 million to US$10 million per transfer.
Bhutan might be one of the smallest countries in South Asia, but it surely had a large stack of Bitcoin.
And I say had because Bhutan’s state investment arm, Druk Holding and Investments, sold another 175 Bitcoin on March 10, extending a steady reduction in its state-held reserves.
The transfer was worth about US$11.85 million (AU$17.4 million) at the time, according to blockchain data. That brings Bhutan’s known Bitcoin sales in 2026 to about US$42.5 million (AU$62.5 million), according to data from Arkham.
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Bhutan Quietly Offloads $42.5M in Bitcoin
Bhutan built most of its Bitcoin position through hydro-powered mining, which gives the reserve a very low cost base. It now holds about 5,400 BTC, worth roughly US$374 million (AU$549.8 million) at current prices.
That is a sharp drop from late 2024, when Bhutan’s reserve stood near 13,000 BTC. The current holding is about 58% lower by coin count.
Bitcoin was trading near US$68,500 (AU$100,695) when the March 10 transfer took place. It later recovered to about US$71,000 (AU$104,370).
Bhutan also made four Bitcoin-related transfers in February, with a combined value of about US$30.7 million (AU$45.1 million). Those included 184 BTC worth US$14.09 million (AU$20.7 million), plus two transfers of about 200 BTC to addresses linked to QCP Capital, a Singapore trading firm that has appeared more than once as a counterparty. Another US$1.5 million (AU$2.2 million) in Tether was sent to a Binance hot wallet.
Arkham has said Bhutan tends to sell Bitcoin in clips of about US$5 million to US$10 million (AU$7.4 million to AU$14.7 million). The latest transfer was slightly above that range.
The sales also put Bhutan’s longer-term plans into question, specifically the fact that, in December 2025, the government said up to 10,000 BTC would support the Gelephu Mindfulness City project, a planned special economic zone focused on technology and digital assets.
With about 5,400 BTC left, Bhutan now holds only about half that amount. That leaves open how it plans to meet the Gelephu commitment if sales continue at the current pace.
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José Oramas Read More