In 2011, a guy bought 10% of every Bitcoin in existence for $5,000


A small company in Tennessee had been mining Bitcoin since the early days
One of their employees asked if he could buy the whole operation
They said yes. The price: $5,000
The wallet he walked away with had 371,067 BTC inside. One out of every ten Bitcoin on Earth
He posted a screenshot of the balance on BitcoinTalk, and the forum lost its mind
Then he vanished
Nobody heard from him until the FBI kicked in his door during the 2012 presidential election
Turns out he had hacked into PricewaterhouseCoopers, stolen Mitt Romney's tax returns, and demanded a $1 million ransom in Bitcoin
The alias he chose for the ransom note: "Dr. Evil"
The way they caught him: a photo of his cat he had posted online
12 felony counts
4 years in prison
He says every last coin is gone: spent, donated, or lost
371,067 Bitcoin
Bought for the price of a used Honda
Exposed by a house cat
BTC-0,63%
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