Today, we celebrate the pseudonymous inventor of Bitcoin (BTC) on Satoshi Nakamoto’s birthday. Satoshi turned 49 today, at least according to information provided to the global network P2P Foundation when he registered.
Happy 49th Birthday, Satoshi Nakamoto
We don’t know who Satoshi Nakamoto is and we likely never will, but the mysterious creator does apparently have a birthday. Satoshi entered a birth date when they (since Satoshi may represent a group of people rather than an individual) registered the pseudonym with The P2P Foundation — suggesting a birthday of April 5, 1975.
Bitcoin enthusiasts have suggested that Satoshi specifically chose this date as it represents a day in 1933 when United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt banned private ownership of gold. All U.S. citizens were then ordered to return the precious metal to the Federal Reserve.
The real identity of the creator of the premier cryptocurrency has remained a mesmerizing puzzle to date. Was it computer scientist and Bit Gold creator Nick Szabo? Was it renowned cryptographer and early Bitcoin contributor Hal Finney? Cryptographer Adam Back? Japanese-American engineer and physicist Dorian Nakamoto? No one knows. What we know for sure is that Australian computer scientist Craig S. Wright is not Satoshi.
BTC is the world’s first scalable peer-to-peer electronic moneysystem. It enables fast, low-fee transactions between any two parties across the globe. Satoshi stepped away from the crypto project in 2011, only for it to grow into a $1.3 trillion global money system that has essentially transformed the world of finance.
Other noteworthy dates for Bitcoin aficionados include Oct. 31, 2008, which marks the anniversary of the day Satoshi unveiled the groundbreaking Bitcoin white paper, as well as Bitcoin Genesis Day on Jan. 3, 2009, commemorating the time Satoshi mined the first BTC block. There are many more to come: the fourth Bitcoin halving scheduled for April 20 and the mining of the 21 millionth coin.
So, happy birthday to you, Satoshi, wherever you might be. Here’s to many more!
