3 January 2009: Bitcoin's genesis block is mined
Satoshi Nakamoto mined the first block of the Bitcoin blockchain, embedding a London Times headline about the Chancellor being on the brink of a second bailout for banks. The timing was not subtle: the financial system was on life support and here was money no central bank could print. For a long time a bitcoin was worth roughly nothing. Few people noticed, which is usually how the really big returns begin.
The lesson: The best and worst bets often look identical at the start: obscure, unproven and easy to laugh at.
What it meant for investors
$1,000 in Bitcoin at the start of 2012 → $20,000,000 today, vs $5,312 in the S&P 500.
We start the clock at the start of 2012, the first year in our price data after the event. That is 20000.0 times the money, and $19,994,688 more than a plain index fund made over the same years.
What Bitcoin teaches: Extraordinary returns came bundled with repeated drawdowns of 75 percent or more; the gains went mostly to holders who could survive each collapse without selling.
| Bought in | Price then | Worth today | S&P 500 would be |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | $5.00 | $20,000,000 | $5,312 |
| 2015 | $315 | $317,460 | $3,301 |
| 2018 | $14,000 | $7,143 | $2,519 |
green = beat the S&P 500 · red = lost money
What if you bought Bitcoin? Every starting year and the full story →
More Bitcoin history
- 7 February 2014: Mt. Gox halts bitcoin withdrawals
- 12 May 2021: Musk stops accepting Bitcoin for Teslas
- 19 May 2021: Bitcoin's May crash
- 22 May 2010: Two pizzas for 10,000 Bitcoin
- 9 June 2021: El Salvador makes Bitcoin legal tender
- 31 October 2008: Satoshi publishes the Bitcoin white paper
Could you have called it at the time? The wheel picks the year, you pick the position, ten seconds a pick.
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