Millions of dollars have been spent on rare memorabilia from bitcoin's past, and some nft auctions have broken records.
bitcoin is now a teenager, and that means there's a growing appetite for throwbacks to the cryptocurrency's early days.
It's like when an unsealed first-generation iPod hits the market. The bidders go completely crazy and end up paying $29,000 for the sentimental value.
Here, we'll look at five of the biggest (and craziest) cryptocurrency-related auctions of all time.
1. The 'Buy bitcoin' sign
Being a digital asset, there are not many tangible memories associated with bitcoin. An honorable exception is a single sheet of paper.
In 2017, then-Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen was testifying before Congress about the state of the economy. In comments that could easily have been yesterday, she warned that the United States was far from returning to its 2% inflation target.
In the background, a 22-year-old hastily scribbled “Buy bitcoin” on his notepad and held it up to the camera during Yellen's testimony. Screenshots of the hack quickly went viral on social media and as a result, btc rose to $2,398 (yes, we know).
Christian Langalis, also known as “bitcoin Sign Guy,” told auction site Scarce City:
“It's nice to finally free this issue from my sock drawer and offer it back to the bitcoin public. The message was subversive then, but now simply obvious: bitcoin is flowing. Control is dead.”
Christian Langalis
The bidding lasted over a week, with the grand finale held at the crypto-themed Pubkey Bar in New York City. It ended up selling for 16 btc, worth around $1 million at the time of writing.
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2. An epic session
The rise of ordinals now means that a single satoshi, the smallest possible denomination of a bitcoin, can be numbered and even converted into an nft.
Ordinals creator Casey Rodarmor says this also means that some sats are significantly more valuable than others, with varying degrees of rarity.
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Satellites found in the “epic” tier include the first ones mined after a halving event.
There are currently only four of them, and after mining company ViaBTC was chosen to add block number 840,000 to the blockchain, it decided to sell the first sat of this current cycle. The auction took place on CoinEx and was auctioned for 33.3 btc, approximately $2.1 million. The exchange later said:
“This epic satoshi symbolizes a historic moment in bitcoin history and has significant collectible and symbolic value for bitcoin enthusiasts, collectors and investors in the cryptocurrency community.”
CurrencyEx
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3. Extraordinary Ordinals
The mania surrounding nfts was initially limited to the ethereum blockchain, but the rise of Ordinals now means that bitcoin has become the dominant selling network.
In December 2023, the esteemed auction house Sotheby's held a BitcoinShrooms auction, and creator Shroomtoshi stated:
“The BitcoinShrooms collection is a pixelated summary of the first 13 years of bitcoin, an homage to the 8-bit art style that expresses a slight nostalgia for the '90s.”
Toshi mushroom
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A select few were available for bidding, each with an estimated value of up to $30,000. But appetite far exceeded expectations and they sold for a total of $450,000.
While not as surprising as the price of OG ethereum nfts when the market was at its frothiest, it is still a sign that the digital collectibles space is not dead yet.
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4. Beeple breaks records
No recap of the biggest auctions in cryptocurrency history would be complete without a nod to Beeple, who began sharing digital art pieces daily in 2007.
The first 5,000 were then stitched together into a vibrant collage and minted as nfts in 2021. What was the final sale price at auction house Christie's, we hear you ask? 69.3 million dollars.
Everydays: The First 5,000 Days not only broke records as the most valuable digital artwork in history, but Beeple became the third most valuable living artist. Accurately predicting what the future will hold for nfts, he said fox news sunday shortly after:
“To be honest, I absolutely think it's a bubble. I return to the analogy of the beginning of the Internet. There was a bubble. And the bubble burst.”
Beeple
5. bitcoin in real life
Last but not least, there have been some feverish auctions lately for Casascius coins – physical btc that were created in the early 2010s.
Inside each metal coin is the private key to a given denomination of bitcoin, making it an incredibly sophisticated form of cold storage.
Their rarity, and the fact that they have not been produced in over a decade, means that they are often priced much higher than the value of btc they hold.
A brass Casascius 1 bitcoin minted in 2011 recently sold for $96,000 at Stack's Bowers Galleries (breaking world records in the process), while a silver one sold for a whopping $102,000.
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