The gov't announced months ago that unclaimed assets seized from Silk Road would be auctioned. The waiting period has now expired.
And why shouldn't it be fast? There is a single person who holds over $1B USD of Bitcoin, so big Bitcoin positions are normal. If you have the US money on-hand, this is a 5 minute decision. No need to drag it out.
The real story is the losers dumping their Bitcoin positions as the market goes down, while the smart people buy up those coins too. I guess the forums and IRC channels are full of people telling you to sell cheap. And next week, they will be telling you to buy high.
That's weird, because whenever the government spends my tax dollars they usually work so hard to make sure they are used in the most prudent way possible, planning well ahead into the future to maximize the value of the resources available to them.
They only made the announcement today and you have to be registered to bid by this coming monday?
Is this typical of government auctions?