Sweden’s Justice Minister Says To ‘Turn Up The Pressure’ On Crypto Seizures

Sweden’s justice minister has called on local authorities to focus on crackdowns that could yield larger seizures of assets including cryptocurrency under a 2024 law that allows the confiscation of luxury items and cash from individuals even if they aren’t the target of an investigation.

According to a Thursday report from financial news outlet Dagens industri, Minister of Justice Gunnar Strömmer said local police, tax authorities and the Swedish Enforcement Authority should put more effort into cases likely to yield crypto proceeds, real estate and other corporate assets. The justice minister reported that the government had seized more than $8.3 million in criminal profits since 2024.

The crackdowns stemmed from a Swedish law that went into effect in November 2024, allowing authorities to confiscate luxury items and large amounts of cash from individuals even if they were not the targets of an official investigation. It’s unclear how much of the $8.3 million reportedly seized was tied to crypto.

“[It] will be possible to take assets with criminal origin from criminals, regardless of whether or not it can be proven that someone has committed an actual offence,” said Sweden’s governing body in October 2024 after the law had passed:

“This means that a person who, for example, has large amounts of cash, sizeable bank assets or luxury articles may forfeit them if he or she does not have an income that is proportional to the property and cannot otherwise explain where it comes from.”

Related: Swedish gov’t pays out $1.5M in Bitcoin to convicted drug dealer

The law, which lawmakers said was passed to address violent crime in Sweden, has had its controversies. The Economist suggested in December that one woman traveling through Gothenburg-Landvetter Airport had had $137,000 and a Rolex watch seized, while authorities reported confiscating roughly $1 million in goods in the first week of enforcement.

Lawmaker calls for a Bitcoin reserve

In April, Swedish member of parliament Rickard Nordin sent a letter to the country’s finance minister requesting she consider adding Bitcoin (BTC) as a reserve asset. Nordin suggested that Sweden emulate the US “budget-neutral” approach to a crypto stockpile by not selling BTC seized by authorities.