Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by our writers are their own and do not represent the views of U.Today. The financial and market information provided on U.Today is intended for informational purposes only. U.Today is not liable for any financial losses incurred while trading cryptocurrencies. Conduct your own research by contacting financial experts before making any investment decisions. We believe that all content is accurate as of the date of publication, but certain offers mentioned may no longer be available.
Ripple CTO David Schwartz is still of the opinion that Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin, is more of a collective than an individual.
The discussions started when crypto enthusiast Mr. Huber, with the Twitter handle @Leerzeit, tweeted that one thing he would never understand was the 100% certainty that Satoshi Nakamoto was gone. He added that if it was a group, the probability was even higher.
That makes sense. It could also have been a group of people and some of them have died leaving the remainder unable to access the keys.
— David "JoelKatz" Schwartz (@JoelKatz) January 27, 2023
Schwartz chipped in: "A group of people just decided to forget about a claim worth tens of billions of dollars?"
It is believed that Nakamoto holds at least 1 million Bitcoins based on the crypto wallets used by the Bitcoin creator. Thus, it is reasonable to conclude that Nakamoto owns about $23 billion in Bitcoin at the current market price.
Tomiwabold OlajideSince it was first created, presumably by Nakamoto, not a single Bitcoin has ever been taken out of any of its wallets, except for the initial 10 BTC transferred to Hal Finney in 2009.
The question of "Who is Satoshi Nakamoto, and why hasn't he, she, or they stepped forward to claim this fortune?" arises with the immense wealth.
Ripple CTO hints reason for untouched wealth
In the Twitter discussions, Neil Hartner, senior staff software engineer at Ripple, gave a possible reason for the untouched wealth: "Maybe they lost the keys and decided to let the mystique live on rather than admit even the smartest people can lose seed phrases."
Ripple CTO David Schwartz replied, "That makes sense." He continued, "It could also have been a group of people, and some of them have died, leaving the remainder unable to access the keys."
CryptoLaw founder John Deaton responded to Schwartz's comment: "I believe CSW (Craig "Satoshi" Wright) was involved at the beginning. He knew no one else would trademark Whitepaper. Hal is dead. Kleiman is dead."
He then added, "Someone died, and the private key died with them?"
On Jan. 12, 2009, Satoshi Nakamoto sent Hal Finney, a renowned cryptographer and computer scientist, 10 BTC.
The renowned cryptographer was the first individual to download and install the Bitcoin software and also to put a price on the cryptocurrency.
Finney was rumored to be the creator of Bitcoin, but reports say he consistently denied this. Finney sadly passed away in August 2014.
Godfrey Benjamin
Gamza Khanzadaev
Vladislav Sopov
Dan Burgin