Satoshi Nakamoto's Million Bitcoins: Why Bitcoin's Creator Is Vastly Richer Than Bill Gates

The cryptocurrency world was shaken by news in early 2025. When Bitcoin reached another all-time high, financial analysts recalculated the total wealth of Satoshi Nakamoto—the mysterious creator of the first cryptocurrency. The results were staggering: according to Arkham, his fortune amounted to $120.4 billion, placing Satoshi in 11th place on the list of the world’s wealthiest people. For comparison, Bill Gates’ wealth at the same time was estimated at around $115 billion. The Bitcoin creator managed to surpass the legendary founder of Microsoft, although the vast majority of people are unaware of his true identity.

This turn of events caused a massive buzz in the crypto community. If Satoshi Nakamoto ever decided to sell his assets, the market could face a catastrophic crash. However, as we will see, most crypto enthusiasts believe this will never happen—though the reason is much more tragic.

How Many Bitcoins the Creator of Cryptocurrency Has Accumulated

Satoshi Nakamoto was a pioneer in the literal sense. When Bitcoin was just emerging in January 2009, he started mining coins on his own computer. The reward for each mined block was then 50 BTC—a figure that seems astronomical by today’s standards.

From January to July 2009, the mysterious developer is believed to have mined over 1 million bitcoins. This makes him not just a successful miner but almost a monopolist during the early days of cryptocurrency. An interesting fact: there is a theory suggesting that Satoshi could have earned even more coins but deliberately limited mining activity by controlling the network’s hash rate. His goal was likely to give other participants a real chance at rewards and thus ensure the project’s decentralization.

How Cryptographers Confirmed the Scale of Satoshi’s Holdings

It is impossible to precisely determine the number of bitcoins mined by Satoshi Nakamoto. However, prominent cryptography and security expert Sergio Damian Lerner conducted a study that provides the most reliable estimate to date.

Lerner meticulously examined all blocks created in Bitcoin’s first year—from January 1, 2009, to January 25, 2010 (blocks 1 through 36,288). His methodology was based on identifying patterns in the sequence of mined blocks that could indicate they belonged to the same person.

The researcher found that one mining farm (or a single powerful node) consecutively mined thousands of blocks and received approximately 1 million bitcoins in rewards. This discovery allowed Lerner to propose a concept he called the “Patoshi Model”—a pattern in the blockchain that characterizes the mining style of an unknown miner. Since this pattern begins with Bitcoin’s very first block (the genesis block), Lerner concluded that Patoshi is Satoshi Nakamoto.

Why the Creator’s Bitcoins Remain Unclaimed After 16 Years

Since 2010, Satoshi Nakamoto has completely cut off contact with the outside world. Over the past decade and a half, the crypto community has made countless attempts to identify him—without any success. No one knows if the developer is alive, where he is, or what plans he has for his colossal bitcoin holdings.

Complete silence and inactivity of his addresses are the main arguments supporting the hypothesis of his death. Many crypto enthusiasts genuinely believe that Bitcoin’s creator has passed away, and therefore these 1.096 million bitcoins can be considered lost forever. In this scenario, about 5.2% of the total cryptocurrency supply is effectively removed from circulation.

However, another part of the community continues to hope—perhaps Satoshi is still alive and simply prefers to stay in the shadows. This uncertainty creates mixed feelings: relief (that the bitcoins won’t flood the market) and anxiety (what if the opposite happens someday?).

Comparing Satoshi’s Holdings to Other Major Bitcoin Holders

To understand the scale of Satoshi Nakamoto’s accumulation, it’s helpful to compare his holdings with other significant players. The company MicroStrategy, which has been actively buying Bitcoin since August 2020, owns about 2.763% of the total supply. This is impressive for a corporate investor but still far behind the creator’s share.

Satoshi’s advantage becomes even more apparent when compared to national reserves or funds. No country or traditional financial institution controls such a large amount of the most valuable cryptocurrency. This demonstrates the influence one developer can have, having laid the foundation for a global financial revolution.

Market Risks That Scare the Crypto Community

The scenario where Satoshi Nakamoto decides to sell even a portion of his holdings causes panic among investors. A sudden influx of 1 million bitcoins onto the market would create an offering that current liquidity on exchanges could hardly absorb. Prices could plummet by dozens or even hundreds of percent.

Nevertheless, the vast majority of crypto enthusiasts believe such a scenario is unlikely. They assume Satoshi has long since passed away, and therefore the market is not threatened by a shock from massive liquidation. This belief has become a kind of calming mechanism for the ecosystem.

The Creator of Bitcoin’s Identity Remains Unsolved

According to one early questionnaire Satoshi Nakamoto filled out during Bitcoin’s development, he was allegedly born on April 5, 1975, in Japan. If true, he would be 50 years old in 2025. However, trusting such information is highly cautious—it could be deliberately false or misleading.

Beyond all this, there are alternative theories suggesting Satoshi Nakamoto is not a real person but a collective image or even a government project. Proponents of this version argue that Bitcoin was created not by a single genius but by a team or even a state-sponsored program. These hypotheses remain on the fringes of the crypto community but highlight how deep and layered the mystery around Satoshi is.

Undoubtedly, the story of Satoshi Nakamoto is one of the most intriguing puzzles of modern times. His bitcoin holdings continue to exert psychological influence on the market, even after a decade and a half of silence.