Time Capsules Cracked: Two Casascius Bitcoin Coins Awaken After 13.2 Years
Digital gold, long thought lost to the ages, just stirred in its slumber. Two physical Casascius coins—literal vaults holding private keys behind tamper-proof holograms—have been activated. Their 13.2-year dormancy is over.
The Long Sleep
These weren't just forgotten passwords in a text file. These were collector's items, tangible artifacts from Bitcoin's primordial era. For over a decade, their value was locked behind a physical seal, a bet on the future made solid. Now, that bet has been cashed.
What Wakes a Sleeping Giant?
The 'why now' is the real story. After 13.2 years, someone decided to peel that hologram and move the underlying Bitcoin. Was it an original holder finally taking profit? An estate settling its affairs? Or a speculator who held a physical asset longer than most traditional financiers hold a stock? The timing cuts through the market's daily noise like a laser.
A Provocative Signal
This isn't a routine transaction. It's a signal flare from the past. It proves that long-term conviction—the kind that ignores bubbles, crashes, and regulatory theater—still exists in this market. While Wall Street funds chase quarterly returns, someone just demonstrated a patience span measured in epochs. It’s a quiet, powerful rebuttal to the short-termism that plagues modern finance—where 'long-term hold' often means waiting until next Tuesday.
The coins are awake. The market should pay attention. Because when relics from 2012 start moving, it's usually a sign that the old guards are making their next play. Just remember, in crypto, 'diamond hands' sometimes literally mean holding a piece of metal for 13 years while the financial world burns and rebuilds around it.
What is a Bitcoin Casascius?
A Bitcoin Casascius is a physical collectible item, usually made FORM silver or gold. The item was created by Mike Caldwell, a Utah based entrepreneur, back in 2011.
According to the Casascius Bitcoin Analyzer website, the collectibles were sold as coins or bars. Coins carried as low as 0.1 BTC to 1,000 BTC, while bars had a minimum of 100 BTC up to 1,000 BTC per bar.
Each Casascius worked as a Bitcoin cold storage device. Each physical coin and bar had a public Bitcoin address. Inside the coin or bar, there’s a redeemable private key, protected by a tamper-evident hologram.
Once the hologram is removed, it leaves a honeycomb pattern as proof of access. Some Casascius are advanced and have an encrypted private key. Owners of such collectibles must decrypt the private keys using a passphrase to redeem the bitcoins.
Caldwell sold 27,912 Casascius coins and bars, funded with digital bitcoins. The items contain a total of 98,483.9 BTC.
In late 2013, Caldwell stopped selling physical coins and bars that contained digital bitcoins. At the time, US FinCEN (Financial Crimes Enforcement Network) said he was acting as an unregistered money transmitter.
According to a post from X user Sani, a total of 17,835 BTC Casascius remain unopened. They carry 36,467 bitcoins worth $3.29 billion.
Dormant BTC continue to MOVE this year. Sani shared a post showing 16 transactions moving 14-year-old BTC. A total of 64 BTC worth $5.7 million moved from various wallet addresses. Unknown entities moved the coins in a span of two days.
In the past hour, 7 BTC moved for the first time in over a decade across four transactions.
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