Recovery of lost crypto, once the injured party holds an enforcement document, proceeds with the instruments of the Georgian Law on Enforcement Proceedings. No rule specific to cryptocurrency could be located in the law, but the mechanisms of the National Enforcement Bureau — the investigation of the debtor's financial position, seizure and realisation — reach digital assets as well, because the mandatory inventory also captures the debtor's legal relationships with third persons: exchange accounts and claims against wallets. This page explains that route under Articles 42, 40, 52 and 53 of the law.
Investigation of the financial position and digital assets
Under the second part of Article 42, the National Enforcement Bureau may oblige the debtor — for instance, a fraudster against whom an enforcement document has been issued — to submit an inventory of his property and information on the legal relationships connected with it. The inventory must also record the property to the demand of which the debtor is entitled against third persons, with the basis and evidence: a claim on an exchange account and other digital demands are thus objects of the inventory.
Under the third part, the debtor gives a written guarantee that the data were submitted as correctly and completely as possible and reports subsequent changes additionally; under the fourth part, failure to submit the inventory within 5 days, refusal to give the guarantee, or knowingly incorrect information triggers liability, and the Bureau itself verifies the correctness and completeness of the data. Concealing a lost asset is therefore a risk for the debtor.
The instrument is valuable precisely because it describes wealth broadly: the inventory captures the debtor's things, his claims and obligations; each claim against a third person is entered with its basis and evidence, and property to which the debtor holds the right of demand is noted separately. Coins assembled on an exchange account, wallets and other digital positions thus become part of the disputed circumstances, and concealing them breaches the guarantee.
Seizure and the securities rule
Once the assets are traced, the seizure chassis of Article 40 operates: seizure of movable property means the description of the debtor's property and the declared prohibition of disposal — alienation, pledge, lease or rental — and/or transfer for safekeeping, recorded in the description-and-seizure act; a transaction concluded after the seizure is void. Article 52 then provides that the rules of seizure and realisation of movable things apply to securities — by the same logic, identifiable digital assets join this machinery.
Institutional rules reinforce the seizure: under the law, the liquidator or special administrator of a commercial bank, a payment-service provider or a microbank may transfer seized accounts to another bank or to the National Bank of Georgia under the respective statutes, and in the case of dematerialised securities may transfer the seized accounts unchanged to another account holder. The rule covers seizures imposed both by the Bureau and by a private enforcement officer, and in the digital-asset context it frames the dealings with the institutions where such assets are held.
Where a third person asserts a right over the property at the moment of seizure, the item is still entered into the act with a note, and the enforcement officer explains the right to sue for release of the property from seizure; on presentation of a document confirming ownership, the officer, with the creditor's consent, removes the property from the act. The question who owns the identified asset is thus resolved before realisation is reached.
Other realisation by agreement
Article 53 offers an important instrument: where the creditor and the debtor agree, on the basis of their statements and before the public announcement of an auction, the National Enforcement Bureau may determine that the seized property shall be realised otherwise than the law prescribes. For crypto this is particularly apt: the parties may agree that the asset be sold on an exchange or transferred directly to the creditor — provided this happens before the auction is announced and under the Bureau's control.
Frequently Asked Questions
Below we answer questions about recovering crypto through the enforcement mechanism.
Can the Bureau trace crypto?
Yes — by the inventory order, which also captures relationships with third persons, including claims on exchange accounts.
What happens if data are concealed?
Non-submission of the inventory within 5 days, refusal of the guarantee, or knowingly incorrect information triggers statutory liability.
How does the asset become subject to seizure?
By description and the prohibition of disposal; securities follow the rules of seizure and realisation of movables.
Is realisation without an auction possible?
Yes — by agreement of the parties, before the auction is announced, under a different procedure determined by the Bureau.
What of a third person's right?
The property enters the act with a note; the third person may sue for release, and on an ownership document it is removed with the creditor's consent.
How We Help on Legal.ge
The Legal.ge team prepares enforcement applications, analyses what must enter the debtor's inventory, and controls seizure and realisation in dealings with the Bureau.
If you need to recover crypto lost to fraud and hold an enforcement document, write to us on Legal.ge — we will build the full chain from tracing to realisation.