Abandoned Wallets Present A Risk to All Digital Wallet Holders

NEW YORK, NY / ACCESS Newswire / August 7, 2025 / Salomon Brothers today announced that its client completed the process of inserting notices into digital wallets in connection with its initiative to address the risks posed by abandoned wallets. An estimated .5% of digital wallets are abandoned by owners who lost their private keys and, according to the Wall Street Journal, as much as 20% of Bitcoin and other digital assets is held in those wallets.

Rogue states and criminal organizations with significant resources pose a credible threat to hack assets held in abandoned digital wallets. Older encryption protocols are vulnerable to new technologies, meaning bad actors could illegally gain access to abandoned wallets because these wallets cannot be upgraded to more secure wallets. Blockchain experts have identified this as a serious threat, warning that the threat is approaching faster than many expect.

"Securing wallets protects the millions of wallets that are not abandoned," said R. Adam Smith, a Salomon Brothers representative. He continued, "risks to all digital wallet holders include government-imposed regulatory limits on crypto holdings in an effort to protect the integrity of crypto markets. All wallet holders therefore have an interest in supporting the resolution of this problem."

The process of securing the wallets included, among other actions, the client causing the insertion of notices into long-dormant wallets. The notices provide wallet owners with at least 90 days to respond.

Notices were sent to wallets that appeared to be abandoned. The client expects that in some instances owners with private keys or other evidence of ownership will step forward.

The notice makes clear that an owner can demonstrate the wallet is not abandoned either by (1) using the private key to conduct an anonymous on-chain transaction; or (2) accessing the Salomon Brothers webpage address provided in the notice and completing the contact form found on the webpage.

Already, some owners responded to the notices by moving their digital assets to new wallets, thereby indicating that the wallets were not abandoned. Last month, owners of dozens of long-dormant wallets engaged in similar action to indicate continued ownership of the wallets.

Salomon Brothers is publicly announcing this initiative at this juncture following completion of the distribution of notices into wallets. Unfortunately, in advance of this announcement, some bloggers and some coin media incorrectly speculated about the notices and the motive of the sender. This announcement is intended in part to address any concerns due to these inaccurate claims.

Salomon Brothers' client plans to allocate a portion of recovered digital assets to a fund intended for wallet owners who lost their keys. The client has engaged Salomon Brothers to administer this arrangement. Details of the recovery fund arrangements will be released in the coming months.

About Salomon Brothers

Salomon Brothers is an investment bank headquartered in New York City. The firm is independent and is not affiliated with any depository institution. Many alumni of the iconic firm are involved with the modern Salomon Brothers. The firm provides services that include capital advisory and strategic advisory services. Services include staking advice for holders of digital currency. Learn more at: https://salomonbros.com

Contact: A. Johnson, media@salomonbros.com

SOURCE: Salomon Brothers