What is the launch date of Bitcoin? Unveiling the starting point of the Crypto Assets era.

On January 3, 2009, a mysterious figure using the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto mined the first block of Bitcoin—the Genesis Block (Block #0) on a small server located in Helsinki, Finland, marking the official launch of the Bitcoin network. This day is recognized as the historic moment of Bitcoin’s birth and signifies the beginning of a new era in the history of human currency.

##Background: A Technological Response to the Financial Crisis The birth of Bitcoin was not a coincidence. After the global financial crisis erupted in 2008, the vulnerabilities of the traditional financial system were fully exposed. Against this backdrop:

• On October 31, 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto published the Bitcoin white paper “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” on a cryptography mailing list, proposing a decentralized electronic payment system that does not require a trusted third party;
• The white paper outlines a distributed ledger model based on blockchain technology, aiming to solve the “double-spending problem” and eliminate cross-border transaction barriers.

The embedded headline from The Times in the genesis block — “The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks” — is not only a proof of the block generation time but also a profound metaphor for the traditional financial system.

##Network Launch: Bridging the Gap from Theory to Practice Only 6 days after the birth of the genesis block, the Bitcoin network welcomed substantial operation:

• On January 9, 2009, Satoshi Nakamoto released the Bitcoin 0.1.0 client (initially supporting only Windows) and made it available for download on the open-source platform SourceForge;
• On January 12, 2009, the first Bitcoin transaction in history was completed: Satoshi Nakamoto sent 10 BTC to cryptographer Hal Finney.

In the early days, Bitcoin had almost no market value. It wasn’t until October 2009 that the first trading platform, New Liberty Standard, provided an initial price: 1 USD = 1,309 BTC.

##Value Awakening: From “Pizza Transaction” to Tenfold Growth The value discovery of Bitcoin has gone through a dramatic process:

• May 22, 2010: Programmer Laszlo Hanyecz exchanged 10,000 BTC for two pizzas, completing the first real-world transaction (equivalent to 1 billion dollars based on the 2025 peak);
• February 2011: Bitcoin price first reached the $1 mark;
• November 2013: The price surged to $1,000, attracting the attention of mainstream media worldwide;
• March 2024: The price of a single coin breaks 70,000 USD, setting a new historical high;
• May 2025: Bitcoin price reaches $111,980, setting a new all-time high again;

##Technical Evolution: Halving Mechanism and Ecological Expansion The economic model of Bitcoin ensures scarcity through algorithms:

• Initial block reward of 50 BTC, halving every 210,000 blocks (approximately every four years);
• Three halvings have been achieved: 2012 → 25 BTC, 2016 → 12.5 BTC, 2020 → 6.25 BTC;
• The total supply is fixed at 21 million coins, expected to be fully mined by 2140.

##Conclusion: A Continuous Revolution Launched on January 3, 2009, Bitcoin has transformed from a geek experiment into a global financial asset. It has not only given birth to thousands of cryptocurrencies but also propelled “Blockchain +” to penetrate fields such as payments, supply chains, and DeFi. Despite facing regulatory and volatility challenges, Satoshi Nakamoto’s original vision of “peer-to-peer electronic cash” continues to reshape humanity’s understanding of the boundaries of currency, trust, and value.

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