A Bitcoin State Reserve by Statute: What the US Bill H.R. 8957 Means for German Holders

On September 16, 2026, the financial services committee of the US House of Representatives advanced a bill, by 28 votes to 21, that would make America's government-held Bitcoin unsellable for at least twenty years. For you as a German investor it changes neither your tax burden nor your holding period today. It does change a quantity you will not see in any portfolio statement: how much Bitcoin in state hands can reach the market at all over the medium term.

This article draws a clean line between what the bill says and what market commentary makes of it. The draft is publicly available, and in several places it reads considerably more soberly than its headlines.

What the US financial services committee decided on September 16

The House Committee on Financial Services debated the bill in what is known as a markup session and then released it for a floor vote. Markup means the committee goes through the text section by section, accepts or rejects amendments and finally votes on the version it recommends to the chamber. The result of 28 votes to 21 fell largely along party lines.

A committee vote of this kind is not legislation. It is the stage at which the vast majority of bills get stuck, and that is exactly why it counts as a signal: no bill on a government Bitcoin reserve had come that far in the United States before.

American Reserve Modernization Act: what the text of H.R. 8957 says

The bill carries the number H.R. 8957 and the short title "American Reserve Modernization Act of 2026". It was introduced on May 21, 2026 by Representative Nicholas J. Begich III of Alaska and then referred to the financial services committee. The official long title states the purpose: to establish a strategic Bitcoin reserve, to manage the federal government's Bitcoin holdings transparently, and to offset the costs through certain funds of the Federal Reserve System.

Operationally the text governs four things. Section 4(a)(1) obliges the Treasury to set up a secure custody facility for Bitcoin within the department. Section 4(d)(1) channels all "qualifying Bitcoin" of the federal government into it. What qualifies is defined narrowly by section 3(4): Bitcoin finally forfeited in a criminal or civil proceeding. And section 5 sets out how long the state has to hold the holdings.

Anyone reading the bill as a purchase programme is reading it wrongly. First and foremost it puts order into what the state already owns.

At least 20 years of holding: why section 5 is the decisive clause

Section 5(a) provides that the Treasury holds all Bitcoin "for not less than 20 years from the date of deposit into the strategic Bitcoin reserve". Section 5(b) prohibits any sale or other disposal during that minimum period. The period runs per deposit, not for the total holding from a cut-off date: if Bitcoin forfeited in 2029 is added, it is locked up until 2049.

This is the clause where something would actually be decided for the market. Government holdings have so far been a latent source of supply; every forfeiture can at some point land on the market as an offer. A statutory lock-up over two decades takes that source out of the equation for as long as the law stands. How large the effect would be hangs on a figure nobody knows reliably.

How much Bitcoin the US actually holds, and why nobody knows exactly

The estimates diverge. The executive order of March 6, 2025, which first established the strategic Bitcoin reserve by decree, capitalised it, on concurring accounts, with around 198,000 BTC originating from forfeitures. For the entire federal holding, by contrast, surveys from early 2026 put the figure at around 328,000 BTC. The range persists because the two numbers measure different things and neither comes from an official, continuously maintained schedule.

The bill itself addresses precisely that gap. Section 6 requires quarterly reports with detailed information on total holdings, transactions and demonstrated control over the private keys, plus a cryptographic attestation, published on the Treasury's website; the Comptroller General, the head of the US audit office, is to review this regularly. That such a duty is needed at all says more about today's state of the data than any single estimate.

No taxpayer money for Bitcoin purchases: the line drawn by section 9

Section 9 instructs the Treasury to examine budget-neutral routes for acquisitions. Named are the conversion of other federal digital assets, surplus remittances from the Federal Reserve System or a revaluation of the gold certificates, as well as proceeds from forfeitures, fines and settlements. Section 9(d) then draws the line and expressly prohibits any borrowing, any new tax and any deficit-financed spending for the acquisition of Bitcoin.

For market expectations this is the coolest passage in the bill. A state that may only reallocate but not buy with fresh money is not a source of demand on which a price forecast can rest. If you need a figure to place the current market situation: Bitcoin was quoted at $84,534.90 on September 23, 2026 at 14:59 UTC on the spot market of the OKX exchange, after $87,283.00 at the day's high and $83,856.40 at the day's low, down 2.0 percent over 24 hours.

From committee to statute: which hurdles H.R. 8957 still has to clear

Several steps are missing before the bill becomes law. The House floor has to call it up and pass it, the Senate has to agree, differences between the two versions have to be resolved, and at the end comes the president's signature. Each of those stations can change the text, and a committee vote along party lines is no indication that it will go quickly.

Then there is the calendar. The 119th Congress ends in early January 2027. Whatever has not been passed by then lapses and would have to be reintroduced in the new Congress. The recent history of US crypto legislation offers plenty of illustration: the CLARITY Act, the far larger market structure bill, did not survive a vote in September 2026. Anyone treating H.R. 8957 as settled today is pre-empting the most likely outcome instead of waiting for it.

Saxony sold 49,858 Bitcoin: what the German comparison case shows

Germany has already taken the opposite route, and did so without a statutory basis for either course. In January 2024 a defendant in the proceedings concerning the movie2k.to portal transferred around 49,858 Bitcoin to the Federal Criminal Police Office; at the then price of about 39,400 euros that came to roughly 1.96 billion euros. Between June 19 and July 12, 2024 the Saxon authorities sold the entire holding in tranches, realising around 2.6 billion euros. The Saxon justice ministry described the exercise as an emergency disposal.

To this day the proceeds are not budget money. They are held on deposit for the criminal proceedings at the Leipzig regional court and will remain so until those conclude. And the much-quoted calculation of how much more a later sale would have brought is hindsight: it presupposes that the authority could know a price path it could not know.

The comparison is therefore no good as a reproach, but it works as an illustration. In the United States a statute is meant to take the timing of a sale out of the realm of discretion and fix it for twenty years. In Germany procedural law decided, and it decided on an immediate sale. They are two answers to the same question, and neither is a recommendation for your own portfolio.

Custody, holding period, concentration risk: what German Bitcoin holders should check now

A US bill is no reason to rebuild your portfolio. It is a good reason to look over three points that decide your outcome regardless of Washington.

The holding period. In Germany, Section 23 of the Income Tax Act applies to privately held crypto-assets: if more than a year lies between purchase and sale, the gain is tax free. Below that it counts as other income, and the 1,000 euro threshold per calendar year is a cliff, not an allowance. Exceed it by one euro and the entire gain is taxable. Check which of your positions reach the one-year mark and when, before you think about selling.

Custody. The bill requires the US Treasury to demonstrate control of the private keys. You can put the same question to yourself: who holds your keys? If the holdings sit on an exchange, you hold a claim against a company, not the coins themselves. For an investment horizon of years that argues for self-custody; which devices come into question and how to recognise a solid model is set out in the hardware wallet comparison.

Concentration risk. A state buyer that, by its own bill, may not buy with fresh money justifies no higher weighting. If a report like this one makes you want to add, first check what share of your total wealth Bitcoin already accounts for. The cost side is the part you can reliably influence: trading fees, spread and withdrawal costs differ markedly between providers, and one percentage point of difference at purchase weighs more over an investment horizon of years than most headlines.

Spot, ETN or your own wallet: which buying route suits which horizon

The twenty-year lock-up in the US bill raises a question that is practically more relevant to you than any price forecast: in what wrapper do you want to hold Bitcoin over long periods? In Germany three routes are essentially open to you, and they differ in tax and legal terms.

With a direct purchase through an exchange or a broker you acquire the coins themselves. Under the European crypto regulation MiCA, providers addressing retail clients in the EU need authorisation as a crypto-asset service provider; whether a provider holds such a licence can be looked up in the register of the competent supervisor and is the first check worth making. For this route the one-year period under Section 23 of the Income Tax Act applies.

With a crypto exchange followed by a transfer to your own wallet, one step is added that takes you out of the provider's counterparty risk. The transfer itself is not a sale and triggers no tax, but it does bring effort and duties of care in securing the recovery words.

Exchange-traded notes on Bitcoin, traded in Europe as ETNs or ETPs, you buy through your existing securities account. They are convenient but carry issuer risk, and their tax treatment is not in every case the same as for direct holdings: depending on the structure, a paper may fall under the flat-rate withholding tax rather than under the one-year period. Which products are tradable in Germany and what to look out for when selecting is worked through in the overview of crypto ETFs and ETNs in Germany. If in doubt, have the specific classification of your paper confirmed by a tax adviser.

Levels above and below: what the Bitcoin price is currently orienting on

The short-term situation has little to do with the bill. Above, the next notable level is $87,283, the high of the past 24 hours; beyond that begins the zone around $90,000, which has not been sustainably overcome so far this year. Below, the day's low at $83,856 marks the first line of support, and beneath it the round number at $80,000, which the market has oriented on several times in mid-September.

These levels are observation points, not signals. They tell you where many market participants are looking, not what happens next.

Bull and bear case: what speaks for and against the supply thesis

The mechanics of the lock-up speak for the bull case. If a structural source of supply falls away over two decades while further forfeitures keep being added, that tightens the freely tradable supply, and does so independently of the demand side. Were a copycat effect among other states to come on top, the impact would be larger than the US holding alone.

Against the thesis speaks, first of all, the text of the bill itself: without permission to buy with fresh money, no new source of demand arises. On top of that, the holdings are not being sold today either, so to that extent a statute fixes an existing state of affairs rather than changing it. And third, every statute is reversible: what one Congress passes a later one can amend, particularly with a period stretching across five electoral terms. Anyone basing a purchase decision on this supply thesis alone is basing it on a law that is not yet one.

Placing the Bitcoin state reserve: what to take away

1. Treat the bill as news, not as a buy signal. H.R. 8957 has passed a committee and nothing else. If you were going to build or reallocate your Bitcoin position anyway, your outcome is decided by the cost side and not by the headline; the differences in fees and spread are in the crypto exchange comparison.
2. Check your own holding period before you sell anything. A sale one day before the one-year mark costs you tax exemption on the entire gain. Which position falls due when is something you should have documented rather than estimated; which tools keep the periods and acquisition dates cleanly is set out in the comparison of crypto tax software.
3. Settle the custody question for your actual horizon. Anyone intending to hold for years should not be left sitting on an exchange permanently. What self-custody achieves and which mistakes get expensive is broken down in the hardware wallet comparison.

You can read the full text of H.R. 8957 in the original at the US publishing office; the procedural status including co-sponsors is tracked by Congress.gov.

(As of September 23, 2026. This article is not investment advice. Prices and fee structures change; check the terms with the provider before you buy.)