A batch of 100.02 BTC mined in 2010 moved for the first time in more than 16 years on Wednesday, with the coins now worth roughly $8.5 million.
The bitcoin was received by an address on July 30, 2010, and remained untouched until a transaction was confirmed at 18:52 UTC Wednesday, according to CoinDesk’s analysis of Bitcoin blockchain data. Galaxy Research, the research arm of crypto financial services firm Galaxy Digital, first flagged the transaction on X.
When the address received the bitcoin, BTC was trading at around 6 cents, giving the 100.02 BTC a market value of approximately $6, based on historical pricing data from StatMuse. That figure reflects the increase in the coins’ market value over time and does not indicate what the holder paid for them or whether any sale occurred.
Long-dormant bitcoin often attracts attention because coins that have not moved for years can suddenly return to circulation. Some may have been assumed to be lost. The successful transfer confirms that someone still controls the coins, but blockchain data does not reveal whether the current holder is the original owner or whether the bitcoin will eventually be sold.
Larger dormant holdings have previously reached the market. Galaxy confirmed in July 2025 that it sold more than 80,000 BTC on behalf of an early investor as part of an estate-planning strategy. Wednesday’s transfer was much smaller, and there is no indication from the transaction records that it represented a sale.
The Address Had Been Active
The transaction generated additional interest because the address had previously moved other bitcoin between 2011 and 2018.
Bitcoin treats each incoming payment as a separate output, allowing users to spend some holdings while leaving others untouched. These unspent transaction outputs, or UTXOs, can remain dormant for years even when the associated address continues to be used.
The address moved 200 BTC in two transactions in August 2015, followed by 100 BTC in December 2017 and 249 BTC in March 2018. The separate 100.02 BTC received in July 2010 remained untouched during all of those transactions.
Galaxy Research said on X that the address had shown some activity previously, but the specific coins in question had not moved since 2010.
CoinDesk traced the 100.02 BTC back to two mining rewards created in July 2010. One reward contained 50 BTC and the other 50.02 BTC, including fees. Bitcoin miners received 50 newly created BTC for each block mined at the time.
The coins date to Bitcoin’s early “Satoshi era,” when its pseudonymous creator, Satoshi Nakamoto, was still active. However, the age and origin of the coins do not demonstrate any link to Nakamoto.
The latest transaction combined the dormant 100.02 BTC with six smaller deposits received later. It sent 10 BTC to one address and approximately 90.02 BTC to another. Both amounts were still unspent when CoinDesk reviewed the addresses Thursday morning.
