1. The $4 Million Pizza Boy
Story:
In 2010, a man named Jeremy Sturdivant received 10,000 BTC from Laszlo Hanyecz in exchange for two Papa John's pizzas—the infamous “Bitcoin Pizza Day” trade.
What happened next?
Jeremy was only 19 at the time. He spent all the BTC on travel within a few months, thinking it was fun “Internet money.”
Years later, that BTC would’ve been worth $400M+ at peak.
He’s at peace with it, but… ouch.
2. Hard Drive in the Landfill – The $300M Mistake
Story:
James Howells, an IT worker from Wales, accidentally threw away a hard drive in 2013 that had 8,000 BTC on it—worth over $300M at peak.
What’s wild?
He has since spent years trying to get permission to dig through his city’s landfill with robotic dogs and AI drones. The city still says no.
He says if he finds it, he’ll give 10% to the city for COVID relief.
Still lost… for now.
3. Lost Laptop, Found Fortune
Story:
A Norwegian man, Kristoffer Koch, bought 5,000 BTC for ~$27 in 2009 for a thesis on encryption.
He completely forgot about it, until Bitcoin made headlines in 2013.
He found his old laptop, retrieved his wallet with a password, and sold a portion of his coins for $885,000—enough to buy an apartment in Oslo.
4. The Accidental Airdrop Wallet
Story:
In 2011, a Redditor bought 500 BTC and stored them on an offline wallet, then forgot the wallet even existed.
Years later (post-2017 bull run), he rediscovered the wallet in a drawer while cleaning out his parents’ house.
He was convinced the seed wouldn’t work—but it did.
He walked away with millions, plus forked coins (like BCH and BSV) that added another six-figure chunk.
5. The Cold Wallet Time Capsule
Story:
An anonymous user posted on Bitcointalk in 2021 about rediscovering an encrypted USB wallet stored in a safety deposit box since 2012.
They originally bought 1,000 BTC under $10 each and had lost the wallet password.
Using a brute-force recovery tool and a lucky guess, they cracked the password in 2021 and revealed their $40M+ stash.
They haven’t posted since.
6. Kids Found Dad’s “Magic Internet Money”
Story:
In 2020, two brothers found an old laptop while cleaning their late father’s garage. It had a Bitcoin wallet from 2011.
He had mined BTC for fun during the early days and forgotten about it.
They recovered the private keys and uncovered over 1,200 BTC—worth over $50M+ at that point.
They used part of it to launch a crypto education nonnon-profit.
7. The IronKey Wallet with $240 Million — But 10 Password Attempts Only
Person: Stefan Thomas, former CTO at Ripple
BTC: 7,002 BTC (~$240M+ at peak)
Story:
Stefan stored his private keys on an IronKey — a super-secure USB drive.
The catch? It only allows 10 attempts to guess the password. After that, it locks forever.
He tried 8 times.
Only 2 attempts left.
He now keeps it locked away in a secure facility... and hasn't dared to try again.
💡 Fun fact: He was later offered free help by hackers and engineers to crack it without losing the data. No updates since.
8. Lost in the Crypto Jungle: Mt. Gox & the Forgotten Keys
Person: Thousands of Mt. Gox users
BTC: Hundreds of thousands lost (~850,000 BTC originally)
Story:
Mt. Gox was the largest BTC exchange in the early 2010s. In 2014, it collapsed due to hacks and mismanagement.
Some users had wallets linked to Mt. Gox but forgot they had coins there.
Years later, when they recovered old email addresses or devices, they realized they had proof of BTC balances — but no access, as the wallets were custodial.
They're now part of an ongoing legal recovery effort that’s taken over a decade.
9. Brain Wallet Disaster
Person: Redditor u/goatpig
BTC: Estimated ~$30,000 at the time (much more now)
Story:
They used a “brain wallet” — a type of wallet generated from a memorized passphrase (no file or hardware).
They were sure they’d never forget the phrase.
Years later, they realized they made one typo when generating the original wallet… and all the coins are now locked away in a dead address, forever.
A single letter off = unrecoverable.
10. The Broken Laptop That Was Worth Millions
Person: Phil (alias from an old crypto forum)
BTC: ~1,400 BTC
Story:
Phil mined BTC on an old MacBook in 2010. He backed up the wallet, but then his drive failed.
He tried data recovery, disk cloning, and even hired experts.
They were able to see the wallet file—but the portion containing the private key was corrupted.
He posted updates for years, still clinging to hope as data recovery tools improved.
As of his last post: no luck yet.