Anonymous holder sends $181K in Bitcoin to Satoshi Nakamoto’s wallet

An unidentified Bitcoin holder sent 2.5 BTC, worth around $181,000, to the wallet tied to Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous architect of Bitcoin who published the network’s foundational whitepaper in 2008 before vanishing from public view around 2011, according to data from Arkham Intelligence.

The transfer, which took place over the weekend, landed in the so-called genesis address, the very first wallet on the Bitcoin blockchain. Satoshi mined this address on January 3, 2009, when the network came online.

Funds routed to this historic wallet are effectively unreachable. Security researchers and blockchain analysts have long concluded that the private keys required to move coins from the address are either lost or were deliberately destroyed.

High-value tributes to the address are uncommon but not unprecedented. Throughout Bitcoin’s history, supporters have periodically sent small amounts to the wallet as a nod to the network’s origins.

Satoshi’s wallet currently holds 1.1 million Bitcoin, valued at around $77 billion at current market prices.

The creator of Bitcoin now ranks as the world’s 25th-wealthiest person, trailing Binance co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, according to Forbes’ real-time billionaire rankings.