From Facebook to Cryptocurrencies: How the Winklevoss Twins Became Bitcoin Billionaires

This is a story about two rowers who received almost nothing from their idea but earned billions from another.

Scandal with Zuckerberg

It all started at Harvard. Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss developed ConnectU — a social network that a young Mark Zuckerberg later worked on. They accused him of stealing the concept. Long legal battles ended in 2008 with a settlement of $65 million. The movie “The Social Network” (2010) celebrated this conflict, but for the twins themselves, it was just the beginning.

Olympians and Cryptocurrency

While the courts were in session, the twins succeeded in another field — representing the USA at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing in rowing, finishing 19th place. But their main decision was to invest part of their money in Bitcoin when it was still unknown to anyone. They accumulated one of the largest reserves of BTC in the world.

In 2014, Gemini was launched - today it is one of the most reputable crypto exchanges in the USA with its own stablecoin and NFT trading.

Where are they now

As of 2024, the Winklevoss twins are billionaires, and their wealth has primarily grown thanks to early bets on Bitcoin. They have actively lobbied for the approval of a spot Bitcoin ETF in the USA, which has indeed happened and facilitated traditional investors' access to cryptocurrencies.

Today they are not just businessmen, but ideologists. They constantly speak at conferences, promoting ideas of decentralization and financial independence through cryptocurrencies. Besides Gemini, they are involved in investments in NFTs and digital art.

Moral of the story: they did not get Facebook, but they got something bigger — they became architects of the financial revolution.