Sixteen years ago today, a Florida programmer named Laszlo Hanicz paid 10,000 bitcoins for two large slices of Papa John’s pizza. At the time, these coins were worth about $41. On this Pizza Day, it’s worth $777.87 million, down $328 million from last year’s anniversary price.
bitcoin pizza day, Observed on May 22 every year, it marks the first commercial transaction using Bitcoin – the moment when the digital currency ceased to be a theoretical experiment and became a means of exchanging real goods.
On May 18, 2010 Hanic to publish On the BitcoinTalk forum with a live offer: 10,000 BTC to anyone willing to order him two pizzas. Some forum users were skeptical, with one pointing out that he could sell the coins for $41 in cash.
Hanich’s response was simple: “I think it would be interesting if I said I paid for the pizza with Bitcoin.” Four days later, a then-19-year-old forum user named Jeremy Sturdivant accepted and ordered pancakes from Papa John’s, collecting 10,000 bitcoins via manual transfer. Bitcoin had its first exchange rate for a consumer good.
Bitcoin haircut worth $328 million
On May 22 of each year, the fixed 10,000 Bitcoins are revalued at the day’s spot price – the cleanest annual benchmark for cryptocurrencies. In 2024, the value of the stack is $674 million. In 2025, it reached a record high of $1.106 billion, with Bitcoin trading at $110,568, an all-time high on that day. Today, with Bitcoin approaching $77,300, the stake is worth $777.87 million – down 29.7% from last year.
The decline began on October 6, 2025, when Bitcoin reached a new all-time high of $126,000. Four days later, President Donald Trump came Announce 100% tariffs on Chinese imports and export controls on critical US software.
Within hours, the total cryptocurrency market capitalization fell by nearly $200 billion in a single session, Bitcoin fell from $122,000 to $107,000, and nearly $19 billion of leveraged positions were liquidated — the largest single-day liquidation event in cryptocurrency history.
Worst start since 2018
The first quarter of 2026 became Bitcoin’s third-worst opening quarter ever, closing down 23.2%, with spot Bitcoin ETFs bleeding $4.5 billion in outflows during the first eight weeks of the year. Iranian tensions have exacerbated the pressure, with US-Israeli air strikes on February 28 triggering a sharp rotation of risk aversion. Bitcoin blockade Between $60,000 and $75,000 during most of March.
The second quarter brought a partial recovery – Bitcoin He almost went up 14% during the quarter – but the broader cryptocurrency market cap is $2.65 trillion today, down from $2.9 trillion just a week ago.
