{"id":34614,"date":"2021-01-12T18:38:14","date_gmt":"2021-01-12T16:38:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/?p=34614"},"modified":"2025-08-28T21:26:42","modified_gmt":"2025-08-28T18:26:42","slug":"satoshi-nakamoto-sent-hal-finney-the-first-bitcoin-transaction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/satoshi-nakamoto-sent-hal-finney-the-first-bitcoin-transaction\/","title":{"rendered":"Satoshi Nakamoto Sent Hal Finney the First Bitcoin Transaction"},"content":{"rendered":"

On January 12, 2009, the creator of Bitcoin, known by the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, sent the first transaction in the Bitcoin network to Hal Finney.<\/p>\n

Unlike Satoshi, far more is known about the first recipient of cryptocurrency.<\/p>\n

Hal Finney, for many years, collaborated with PGP Corporation, developing encryption software. He launched the first anonymous remailer<\/a> and was on the early mailing list among cypherpunks.<\/p>\n

Six months before his death in August 2014, Finney described<\/a> his experience with the early interaction with Bitcoin:<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cWhen Satoshi released the software, I connected immediately. I think I was the first person besides Satoshi to run Bitcoin. I mined 70-odd blocks, and became the recipient of the first Bitcoin transaction.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Satoshi sent ten coins in the first transaction as a test. In the following days Finney corresponded with the Bitcoin creator by email, helping to fix bugs.<\/p>\n

\\\"12<\/p>\n

Details of the first Bitcoin transaction. Data: Blockchain<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

According to Finney, Satoshi\u2019s identity remained a mystery to him. The developer speculated that he was dealing with \u201ca young Japanese-born man, very smart and sincere.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cA few days later, Bitcoin worked fairly steadily, so I stayed online. Those were the days when difficulty stood at 1, and you could mine on a CPU. In the days that followed I mined a few blocks, but turned off the computer because it heated up and the fan noise irritated me,\u201d \u2014 wrote Finney.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Describing his experience in 2014, the developer regretted his initially low interest in Bitcoin. After helping test the network and his first mining experience, Finney simply shut down the client.<\/p>\n

He returned to Bitcoin in 2010, when Laszlo Hanyecz bought two pizzas for 10,000 BTC and Bitcoin was first exchanged for dollars.<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cI blew the dust off my old wallet and was relieved to find that my bitcoins were still there. My kids are tech-savvy enough that I left the cryptocurrency to them as an inheritance,\u201d \u2014 the developer wrote.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Read more about Hal Finney\u2019s life and his contributions to the crypto industry in our feature.<\/p>\n

Follow ForkLog news on Twitter<\/a>!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On January 12, 2009, the creator of Bitcoin, known by the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto, sent Hal Finney the first transaction in the Bitcoin network.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":34615,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"select":"1","news_style_id":"1","cryptorium_level":"","_short_excerpt_text":"","creation_source":"","_metatest_mainpost_news_update":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[18,376,111],"class_list":["post-34614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-bitcoin","tag-hal-finney","tag-satoshi-nakamoto"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"views":"49","promo_type":"1","layout_type":"1","short_excerpt":"","is_update":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34614"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34614\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34616,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34614\/revisions\/34616"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}