On May 22, the first real purchase for bitcoins was made - programmer Laszlo Heinitz bought 2 pizzas for 10,000 BTC.
Since then, the crypto community has celebrated Bitcoin Pizza Day every year.
Every year on May 22, the cryptocurrency community celebrates Bitcoin Pizza Day. The reason for the celebration was a landmark event for the crypto industry - in 2010, programmer Laszlo Heinitz purchased two Papa John’s pizzas for 10,000 BTC. This move marked the first known purchase of real goods using Bitcoin. At that time, no one could have imagined the size to which Bitcoin could develop.
Laszlo Heinitz was an active promoter of Bitcoin. He was always active on the Bitcointalk forum - the main place where all cryptans gathered at that time. The legendary Satoshi Nakamoto was also present at the same forum. Heinitz repeatedly entered into dialogue with him.
In addition to discussions, Heinitz was also involved in mining. He became one of the first to use video cards for mining. He managed to collect about 100,000 BTC through mining.
In May 2010, the value of one bitcoin was tiny. Heinitz posted an ad on Bitcointalk asking him to buy 2 pizzas for home delivery for 10,000 BTC. Jeremy Sturdivant agreed to do it. He paid for the order with a bank card, buying two Papa John’s pizzas, and received 10,000 BTC from Heinitz. It is noteworthy that Heinitz published his proposal on March 18th, and received the pizza on March 22nd. That is, he had to wait “only” four days for the order to be completed.
“I wanted to do it because at that time it was free pizza for me. I received pizza for participating in an open-source project. Usually a hobby requires a lot of financial investment and time, but in my case it brought me lunch,” noted Heinitz.
Pizza purchased for 10,000 BTC.
Since then, May 22 has been Bitcoin Pizza Day. The whole world comes up with various competitions and activities on this topic. For example, the head of Binance, Changpeng Zhao, personally prepared pizza for visitors to Mister Pizza in Cannes in 2022.
Heinitz was repeatedly reprimanded for spending as much as 10,000 BTC on two pizzas. Today, with these bitcoins you can buy a bunch of pizzerias and, in general, provide yourself and your children with a comfortable life for several generations. However, Heinitz does not regret the purchase. Firstly, he became a famous person in the crypto community thanks to his act, due to which he earned a lot of money. Secondly, his move helped popularize Bitcoin. There are suggestions that if it had not been for that purchase, Bitcoin would not have gained such high popularity.
As for Jeremy Sturdivant, he quickly spent the 10,000 BTC he received on everyday trifles. He didn't become a millionaire. Sturdivant sold his last coins at a rate of about $400 per bitcoin. He notes that he made a successful investment, earning more than 1,000% profit.
Heinitz also did not wait for the price of Bitcoin to reach thousands of dollars and sold all his coins by the beginning of 2013, earning $4,000. With the funds received, he purchased several PCs and video cards that he needed for his main activities in the IT field. It is noteworthy that during 2010 he bought another 50,000 BTC worth of pizzas.
“With 100,000 BTC, I would be a billionaire right now, but I wouldn’t have gotten the pizza then,” Laszlo noted.