Bitcoin worth about $8.5 million has moved after remaining dormant for more than 16 years, involving 100.02 BTC that were mined when the cryptocurrency was worth just a few cents.

The coins were sent to an address on July 30, 2010, and stayed untouched until a transaction was confirmed at 18:52 UTC Wednesday, according to CoinDesk’s review of Bitcoin transactions. Galaxy Research, the research division of Galaxy Digital, first brought attention to the transfer on X.

BTC was trading near 6 cents when the address received the coins, meaning the 100.02 BTC had a market value of roughly $6 at the time, according to historical data from StatMuse. The comparison highlights the coins’ long-term appreciation but does not show the holder’s original acquisition cost or indicate that the bitcoin was sold.

Dormant bitcoin holdings frequently attract scrutiny because coins that have remained inactive for years can suddenly become spendable again. Some are presumed to have been lost when their owners disappear from the blockchain for long periods. The latest transfer shows that someone still controls the private keys, although the public ledger cannot establish who owns the bitcoin or whether the holder plans to sell.

Much larger dormant holdings have previously moved. Galaxy said in July 2025 that it sold more than 80,000 BTC for an early investor as part of an estate-planning process. The latest transfer is considerably smaller, and the blockchain records do not show that the 100.02 BTC was sold.

Dormant Coins From an Active Address

The transaction was particularly notable because the address itself had been active before, moving other bitcoin between 2011 and 2018.

Bitcoin tracks individual incoming payments separately. This allows a user to spend certain deposits while leaving others untouched. These separate unspent amounts are known as UTXOs, meaning an address can remain active even as specific coins sit dormant for years.

The address transferred 200 BTC in two transactions in August 2015, followed by 100 BTC in December 2017 and 249 BTC in March 2018. The 100.02 BTC received in July 2010 were never spent during that period.

Galaxy Research noted on X that although the address had been used in the past, the particular coins involved in Wednesday’s transfer had remained untouched since 2010.

CoinDesk traced the funds to two Bitcoin mining rewards generated in July 2010. One reward contained 50 BTC and the other 50.02 BTC, including fees. At that point in Bitcoin’s history, miners received 50 newly created BTC for each block they mined.

The coins originated during Bitcoin’s so-called “Satoshi era,” when pseudonymous creator Satoshi Nakamoto was still active. Their age and mining history, however, do not prove that Nakamoto had any connection to them.

In Wednesday’s transaction, the old holdings were combined with six smaller deposits received later. The resulting transfer sent 10 BTC to one address and approximately 90.02 BTC to another. Both amounts remained unspent when CoinDesk checked the addresses Thursday morning.