Film Director Challenges Peter Todd’s Denials of Bitcoin Creator Claim

Cullen Hoback, director of the film Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery, continues to assert that programmer Peter Todd is the creator of Bitcoin. He told DLNews.

Since the film’s release, disagreements have persisted between the director and the developer. Todd believed he was participating in a documentary about Bitcoin’s history and was surprised by Hoback’s conclusions regarding Satoshi Nakamoto. Since then, the programmer has repeatedly denied these claims and expressed concerns about his safety, while Hoback has maintained that Todd is the creator of the first cryptocurrency.

A key argument for the documentarian remains a snippet from a forum exchange on BitcoinTalk. In his view, messages from Satoshi and Todd were sent by the same person. The programmer allegedly intended to add to his previous post but accidentally used the wrong account.

On November 11, 2024, in an interview with Pete Rizzo at PubKey, Todd noted that he merely added to the text. Moreover, at that time, his account was signed with a pseudonym, not his real name. 

The programmer insists that despite questions about Satoshi’s identity and involvement in Bitcoin’s creation, he was unaware of the film’s main thesis. He admitted he might have played along with the director in his responses, but nothing more. 

“Of course, I played along a little. For the record, I am as much the creator of Bitcoin as you are,” Todd emphasized.

He suggested that the idea to shift the film’s focus to the identity of Bitcoin’s creator came to Hoback during production:

“I suspect Cullen approached HBO saying ‘we’ll make a documentary about Bitcoin’s development, cypherpunks, and the like,’ but only after filming hours and hours of material did he realize it’s less exciting than QAnon people.”

According to Todd, he was unaware that other invited experts, including Samson Mow, were informed about the film’s theme.

The developer added that he had previously been proclaimed the creator of the first cryptocurrency. He speculated that the director saw one of these decade-old exposés and drew an erroneous conclusion from it.

Hoback, on the other hand, claims that all participants in the filming knew from the start what the film would be about. According to the director, after their first interview, Todd demanded “to leave Satoshi alone,” which means he could not have been unaware of the film’s topic.

The documentarian believes Todd is “intellectually dishonest, or simply has a poor memory,” in denying his awareness.

“I just don’t think Todd is the person people want to see behind the mask of Satoshi,” Hoback added.

Back on October 31, an event in London featured a man named Steven Mulla who proclaimed himself Satoshi Nakamoto.