Hidden Assets and Crypto: The New Battleground in Financial Remedies

Divorce used to involve bank accounts, property, and pensions. It now involves wallets, exchanges, seed phrases, and deliberate amnesia.

The duty of full and frank disclosure has not changed. What has changed is the ease with which assets can be concealed, moved, or obfuscated at the click of a button. Cryptocurrency has made non-disclosure easier to attempt and harder to detect, but no more lawful.

The court expects disclosure of all assets, regardless of form. Bitcoin is no different in principle from cash in a safe. Tokens, stablecoins, NFTs, and decentralised finance holdings all fall within the disclosure obligation. The label does not matter. Control does.

A common myth is that crypto is invisible. It is not. Blockchains are public ledgers. Transactions leave trails. What is difficult is linking a wallet to an individual. That difficulty shrinks rapidly once exchanges, on-ramps, emails, devices, and historic banking patterns are examined together.

Another misconception is that assets held “for trading” or “temporarily moved” do not need to be disclosed. They do. So do assets held abroad, in another name, or under the control of a third party. The test is beneficial ownership, not convenience.

The court is increasingly alert to the signs of digital concealment: sudden interest in crypto shortly before separation, unexplained depletion of savings, vague disclosure schedules, and selective memory loss. Where disclosure is deficient, the court is entitled to draw adverse inferences. That can be fatal.

Valuation presents its own problems. Crypto is volatile. The court will usually adopt a pragmatic approach, fixing a value at or around the hearing date and adjusting if fairness requires. Arguments that volatility makes valuation impossible are rarely persuasive.

Non-disclosure carries real consequences. The court can reopen settlements, set aside orders, penalise costs, and in extreme cases refer matters for contempt. The notion that digital assets sit beyond the court’s reach is misplaced.

The practical lesson is simple. If you hold crypto, disclose it properly. If you suspect it is being hidden, act early. Delay allows assets to dissipate and evidence to vanish. Early forensic analysis often costs less than late-stage litigation.

Financial remedies are no longer fought solely over bricks and mortar. They are fought over passwords, platforms, and digital footprints. The battleground has shifted. The legal principles have not.

If you have a legal dispute, contact Hunter Lawyers for a free confidential consultation.