In brief
- Today celebrates Bitcoin Pizza Day, when a man spent 10,000 BTC to buy two pizzas in May 2010.
- Bitcoin back then was worth pennies, with the pizza purchase valued at just $41.
- The price of Bitcoin continued to push to new highs on Thursday, 15 years after the event.
Bitcoin has broken yet another new all-time high on the 15th anniversary of Bitcoin Pizza Day—when American Laszlo Hanyecz famously bought two pizzas using 10,000 BTC in 2010.
Back then, the price of the leading cryptocurrency stood at next to nothing, with the asset trading from $0.001 to a high of $0.29 at the end of the year, and was only available on a handful of niche exchanges.
Fast-forward 15 years, and BTC just hit a new high of $111,770 Thursday afternoon, according to CoinGecko. That record price means 10,000 BTC today is worth over $1.1 billion, or 2,726,000,000% more than the $41 paid for the two Papa John’s pies on Bitcoin Pizza Day.
Bitcoin Pizza origins
Bitcoin Pizza Day celebrates the time that Hanyecz wrote on a Bitcoin forum asking if someone would send him food in exchange for 10,000 BTC.
“I’ll pay 10,000 Bitcoin for a couple of pizzas… like maybe 2 large ones so I have some left over for the next day,” he posted on May 22, 2010.
“If you’re interested, please let me know and we can work out a deal,” he added.
A fellow Bitcoiner responded to Hanyecz, taking him up on the offer.
It’s worth noting that the Papa John’s restaurant did not accept cryptocurrency, and someone bought the pizzas and sent them to Hanyecz’s house using dollars in exchange for the 10,000 BTC.
But the story is marked every year for one of the first known times Bitcoin was used to buy something—and a startling reminder of how much the price of BTC has surged over the last 15 years.
Bitcoin is booming
Since then, the price of the digital coin has endured several booms and busts, and is no longer just a tool used by people to buy drugs on dark web marketplaces or reimburse strangers for long-distance pizza orders.
Crypto exchanges are now available across the globe, and institutions have jumped in headfirst, with Bitcoin exchange-traded funds managed by the likes of Wall Street giants BlackRock and Fidelity allowing customers to get exposure to the cryptocurrency.
The U.S. government even has a strategic Bitcoin reserve in the works, thanks to President Trump’s recent executive order—with the idea to hold the cryptocurrency like it does with other assets, such as gold.
Still, Bitcoin was created as an alternative to fiat currency and the traditional banking system, so one could send and receive money without going through a middleman.
And despite the fast rise of the digital asset, it still isn’t easy to spend Bitcoin on pizza or other real-world items. Things might be changing—albeit slowly—after American fast food chain Steak ‘n Shake announced last week that customers could use the cryptocurrency to buy burgers.
The move is unusual, though, and most restaurants still don’t accept the big orange coin. While some businesses do accept BTC payments, many Bitcoiners are indeed reluctant to spend the money given its growing status as a store-of-value asset and its sizable long-term gains.
Given how much the value of Hanyecz’s BTC grew in the 15 years since he swapped 10K worth for a couple pizzas, it’s easy to see why Bitcoiners wouldn’t want to repeat his feat.
Edited by Andrew Hayward
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