Home / Year by year / 2010

2010 The pizza year

Bitcoin acquired its first real-world price, its first exchange and its first major bug. By the end of the year its creator had stepped back from the project.

Year-end price (approx.)

~$0.30

Block reward

50 BTC

Pizza price

10,000 BTC

What happened

1. May 22

   Programmer Laszlo Hanyecz pays 10,000 BTC for two pizzas, the first widely recognised purchase of a physical good with Bitcoin. The date is now celebrated as Bitcoin Pizza Day.

2. Jul

   Mt. Gox begins operating as a Bitcoin exchange, and a widely read technology news story brings a wave of new attention and the first sharp price rise.

3. Aug 15

   A bug lets someone create about 184 billion BTC in a single transaction. The invalid block is rolled back within hours by a software fix.

4. Dec

   Satoshi’s last public forum posts appear, including a plea to keep Bitcoin out of the WikiLeaks controversy, and developer Gavin Andresen steps into a larger role.

Why it mattered

A price, a marketplace and a first stress test: the three things any young monetary network needs.

Price by month

Bitcoin price on the first day of each month, in US dollars, with the change from the previous month. Data starts in Jul.

• Jul$0.09–
• Aug$0.06−33%
• Sep$0.06+0%
• Oct$0.06+0%
• Nov$0.20+233%
• Dec$0.23+15%

See all years and months →

Browse every year