Satoshi Nakamoto — the pseudonymous Bitcoin (BTC) creator — may have mined over 1.1 million bitcoins if the details from a recent report are to be believed. Early Bitcoin miners like Satoshi were able to use CPUs to secure the network during the project’s infancy.
The $10.9B Satoshi Stash
According to a report by Whale Alert published on Monday, an in-depth examination of the “Patoshi pattern” puts the Bitcoin creator’s horde at 1,125,150 BTC instead of the more conservative 600k-700k BTC claimed by previous studies. Given the current spot market price, the unknown Bitcoin creator could be holding about $10.9B worth of BTC.
Expanding on Sergio Lerner’s 2013 discovery of the Patoshi pattern, Whale Alert claimed to have been able to attribute more blocks to the Bitcoin creator beyond block height 20,000. As part of the document, the researchers revealed that Satoshi’s mining activity extended up until block 54,316.
By determining the average mining speed of Satoshi’s early activities — between block 2,000 and 16,000 — the researchers at Whale Alert claim to have deduced the intervals within which the Bitcoin creator adjusted his mining capacity as more participants entered the network. Commenting on this discovery, the article reads:
“As more “honest” miners joined the network and a 51% attack became less likely, Satoshi was able to gradually scale down his mining activities. Second, Satoshi stated that the ideal block time was around 10 minutes and by controlling enough processing power it was possible to artificially keep the block time around this time when there was not enough or too much activity on the network.”
According to the report, Satoshi likely used upwards of 48 CPUs at a time to secure the network. Apart from the 48 actively mining CPUs, the Bitcoin creator may have also kept other computers on standby to repel any 51% attack on the young network.
The Whale Alert post also argues that Satoshi was responsible for other non-Patoshi pattern blocks. If true, then the Bitcoin creator might own even more than 5% of the entire Bitcoin supply.
Interest in the Patoshi Pattern
The complete picture of Satoshi’s BTC ownership continues to fascinate crypto enthusiasts. The topic gained even more attention in 2020 on two separate occasions involving addresses holding Bitcoin mined in 2009 and early 2010.
On both occasions, researchers determined the coins did not belong to Satoshi as they were not part of the Patoshi pattern. In one instance, an early miner signed a message with a set of addresses calling self-professed Bitcoin creator, Craig Wright, a fraud and a liar.
As previously reported by CryptoPotato, Lerner believes that Satoshi’s BTC stash will forever remain untouched.
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