Roughly 100 BTC mined during Bitcoin’s early “Satoshi era” moved late Wednesday after remaining untouched for more than 16 years. The coins, which were worth only pennies when mined, are now valued at around $8.5 million.
The 100.02 BTC were sent to an address on July 30, 2010, where they remained dormant until a transaction was confirmed at 18:52 UTC Wednesday, according to CoinDesk’s review of Bitcoin transaction records. Galaxy Research, the research division of crypto financial services company Galaxy Digital, was the first to highlight the movement on X.
Bitcoin was trading at roughly 6 cents when the address received the coins, giving the holdings a market value of about $6 at the time, based on historical pricing data from StatMuse. This comparison reflects the dramatic increase in the coins’ value and does not indicate how much the holder originally paid or whether the bitcoin was later sold.
Long-dormant bitcoin holdings often attract attention because coins that have been absent from circulation for years can suddenly become available for spending or selling. Some may even have been assumed to be permanently lost. However, a successful transfer only confirms that someone still controls the private keys needed to spend the coins. Public blockchain records cannot determine whether that person is the original owner or whether they plan to sell.
There have been cases involving significantly larger dormant holdings entering the market. In July 2025, Galaxy confirmed that it had sold more than 80,000 BTC on behalf of an early investor as part of an estate-planning strategy. Wednesday’s movement was considerably smaller, and the available transaction records do not indicate that a sale took place.
Old Coins, Active Address
The transfer drew attention online because the same address had previously sent other bitcoin between 2011 and 2018.
Bitcoin tracks each incoming payment separately, meaning a wallet can spend one batch of coins while leaving another untouched. These individual unspent outputs are known as UTXOs. As a result, an address can remain active while specific coins associated with it remain dormant for many years.
The address moved 200 BTC through two transactions in August 2015, followed by another 100 BTC in December 2017 and 249 BTC in March 2018. However, the separate 100.02 BTC received in July 2010 remained unspent during that entire period.
“While this address has shown some activity in the past, these particular coins have remained untouched since 2010. We track the coins,” Galaxy Research said on X.
CoinDesk traced the 100.02 BTC directly to two mining rewards generated in July 2010. One reward contained 50 BTC, while the other held 50.02 BTC, including transaction fees. At that time, Bitcoin miners — computers competing to add new transactions to the blockchain — received 50 newly created BTC for each block they successfully mined.
The coins originated during the “Satoshi era,” the early period of Bitcoin’s history when its pseudonymous creator, Satoshi Nakamoto, was still active. However, the age of the coins alone does not indicate any connection to Nakamoto.
Wednesday’s transaction combined the dormant holdings with six small deposits received later. It then sent 10 BTC to one address and approximately 90.02 BTC to another. Both resulting holdings were still unspent when CoinDesk checked the transactions Thursday morning.
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