Bitcoin Pizza Day 2022: Two Pizzas from 12 Years Ago Are Now Worth $300 Million

May 22 is known in the crypto community as “ Bitcoin Pizza Day” because on that day in 2010, Florida software engineer Laszlo Hanyecz spent 10,000 bitcoins — roughly $300 million at today’s prices — on two Papa John’s pizzas.

Laszlo Hanyecz is a computer programmer living in Jacksonville, Florida's most populous city. He works for GORUCK, an American company founded in 2008 by Jason McCarthy that designs and manufactures rugged (military-grade) backpacks, footwear, and clothing. Laszlo was one of GORUCK's earliest employees, in fact, he built GORUCK's first website, and he has been managing its IT systems ever since.

It all started when Bitcointalk forum member and pizza lover Laszlo (username: “laszlo”) created a thread titled “Bitcoin Pizza?” On May 18, 2010, he posted the following message:

“I’d be willing to spend 10,000 Bitcoins on a couple of pizzas… maybe two large ones so I have some leftover for the next day. You could make the pizzas yourself and deliver them to my house or order them for me from a delivery point, but my goal is to get food in exchange for Bitcoins that I don’t have to order or prepare myself, like ordering a breakfast platter at a hotel or something. If you’re interested, let me know and we can work out a deal…”

Three days later, he still hadn’t found anyone willing to accept his 10,000 BTC for two pizzas:

“So no one wants to buy me a pizza? Is the amount of Bitcoin I offered too low?”

On May 22, 2010, four days after he initially posted his offer, forum user ("jercos") Jeremy Sturdivant accepted his offer and provided him with two Papa John's pizzas:

“Just wanted to report that I successfully traded 10,000 bitcoins for pizza…thanks jercos!”

Since one Bitcoin was worth $0.0025 at the time, this meant that laszlo’s 10,000 BTC was only worth around $25 at the time of the transaction.

Interestingly, the following month (June 12, 2010), since Laszlo still loved pizza and still had a lot of Bitcoin, he posted the following message again:

“BTW, this is an open offer. I’ll trade 10,000 BTC for 2 pizzas anytime I have the funds (which I usually have plenty). If anyone is interested, let me know. This deal is good for anyone since the two pizzas are only about $25 total, and I can add some more bitcoin if you upgrade me to a super large pizza.”

On May 27, 2018, when Bitcoin was trading at around $8,000, Cointelegraph interviewed Laszlo and Jeremy. During this interview, Laszlo was asked if he regretted paying 10,000 Bitcoin for two pizzas.

“I have no regrets. I think it’s great that I was part of the early history of Bitcoin in this way, and it’s an interesting story.”

Laszlo experimented with Bitcoin’s Lightning Network on February 25, 2018 by purchasing another two pizzas, this time for 649,000 satoshis (equivalent to around $62 at the time), and was also asked if the Lightning Network could help Bitcoin gain more mainstream adoption.

Laszlo replied: “The Lightning Network is not perfect either, it has problems and can be abused in various ways, but it is a step in that direction and to me, if something like the Lightning Network is successful, I think you’ll see every online retailer switch to it because nobody wants to use Mastercard, Visa, and PayPal .”

In May 2019, the American TV show 60 Minutes also interviewed Laszlo about his initial pizza purchase in May 2010. In an interview with journalist Anderson Cooper, Laszlo stated that he had spent around 100,000 BTC on purchases (mostly pizza!) since 2010.

Earlier today, Michael J. Saylor, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Nasdaq-listed business intelligence company MicroStrategy Inc. (NASDAQ: MSTR), said: “On January 3, 2009, Bitcoin was created and operated for 504 days without any economic value until May 22, 2010 (Pizza Day) when two pizzas sold for 10,000 Bitcoins.”

Binance co-founder and CEO Changpeng Zhao (aka “CZ”), a prominent figure in the crypto space, served Binance Pizza in France today.