Bitcoin’s purported creator may not be able to hand over $3 billion of his fortune

PORTLAND : The man who claims he invented the world’s largest cryptocurrency and was ordered by a judge to surrender about $3 billion of his Bitcoin holdings said he may not be able to do so anytime soon.

In a statement to Bloomberg News, Craig Wright said that he “cannot be certain that information will in fact arrive” to help identify the coins he has to split in a legal dispute. The Australian scientist added that he hasn’t said the “private keys” to those coins would become available or be actually used next month.

Earlier this year, U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart in West Palm Beach, Florida, said Wright submitted false documents and lied in the legal dispute. He ruled that the late Dave Kleiman owned half of all Bitcoins that Wright mined through 2013, and half of all intellectual property he created.