- The recipient of 10,000 BTC paid by Laszlo Hanyecz for 2 pizzas was 19-year-old student Jeremy Sturdivant.
- He got rid of the coins when their value rose from $40 to $400.
- The legendary coins themselves entered the then still undeveloped Bitcoin economy.
Every year on May 22nd, the global digital asset community celebrates Bitcoin Pizza DayThis historical event takes us back to the first documented commercial transactions using cryptocurrency. In 2010, Florida programmer Laszlo Hanyecz transferred 10,000 BTC to 19-year-old student Jeremy Sturdivant (known online as jercos) in exchange for two large Papa John’s pizzas.
At the time, the BTC rewards Hanyecz mined on his home computer were worth approximately $41. Today, they are valued at a fortune worth over $770 million.
It’s common for the community to laugh or sympathize with this short-sighted waste of now-precious coins, but few people ask where exactly those 10,000 bitcoins went.
Thanks to Bitcoin’s immutable and transparent blockchain, it is possible to trace the fate of the most famous transaction in the history of cryptocurrency.
Contrary to popular belief that Jeremy Sturdivant saved 10,000 BTC to become an overnight billionaire, online data paints a very different picture. In 2010, HODL concept simply did not exist, and Bitcoin was viewed solely as an experimental protocol and not as a long-term store of value.
Blockchain data showSturdivant transferred funds from his address for several months after the transaction. In subsequent interviews, he confirmed that he gradually liquidated all 10,000 BTC when their total value reached approximately $400. He used the resulting fiat funds to travel across the United States with his girlfriend by car.
Mass fragmentation and the Mt. Gox era
After the funds left Sturdivant’s main wallet, 10,000 BTC entered the nascent digital economy. The coins from the legendary transaction were continually split into smaller, unspent transaction outputs (UTXO), first into segments of 1000 BTC, and then into segments of 500 and 100 BTC.
From 2011 to 2013, a significant portion of these bitcoins was concentrated on the Tokyo-based exchange Mt. Gox, which at the time handled over 70% of the world’s bitcoin trading volume. Approximately 55–60% of these “pizza coins” were sent to Mt. Gox liquidity pools, where they were bought and sold, and joined the global market supply.
The Final Destination and Sleeping Whales
At present, analytical companies specializing in Block-technologies, there are three separate categories of wallets that hold BTC:
- Active circulation on exchangesMore than half of the supply was distributed globally through the first trading platforms and has since been purchased by millions of private investors worldwide.
- Inactive whale addressesA small percentage of BTC has migrated to large private wallets that have remained untouched for over a decade. It is believed that some of these addresses are inactive due to lost private keys.
- The path of confiscation by the governmentA small portion (~5-7%) of the coins passed through addresses associated with the first darknet marketplaces, including the infamous Silk Road. After the platform’s closure in 2013, these specific coins were confiscated by US federal authorities and subsequently sold at public auctions.
Interestingly, both participants in the first commercial transaction on the Bitcoin blockchain expressed no regrets even after the rise in BTC price.
If we assume that they have bridged the gap between abstract cryptographic code and real practical use, then this understanding can indeed be satisfying.
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