'Brother 480,000' is an ordinary office worker, and his real name is unknown.
On January 28, 2014, he secretly posted on the Bitcoin forum that he had invested the entire 480,000 yuan down payment that he and his wife had saved for seven or eight years into the Bitcoin market, buying 100 Bitcoins at the then price of about 4,800 yuan each, hoping to turn the down payment into a full payment, and even make some extra money for a car, which is why he was nicknamed 'Brother 480,000'.
At that time, influenced by the Bitcoin bull market of 2013, its price once broke through 5,000 yuan. Brother 480,000 believed this was a rare opportunity.
However, just three days after he bought Bitcoin, the price began to fall. Though there was a brief rebound, the market conditions then drastically worsened.
In April 2014, the Mt. Gox exchange collapsed, and governments in multiple countries began regulating Bitcoin. The price of Bitcoin plummeted from around 5,000 yuan to about 2,000 yuan, and 'Brother 480,000' saw his assets shrink significantly, while also being mocked by friends. Meanwhile, his family discovered his investment activities and demanded that he sell his Bitcoin.
In May 2014, the price of Bitcoin briefly rose to around 3,600 yuan, but quickly fell back to about 2,000 yuan.
By June, he posted that the market value of his 100 Bitcoins had shrunk to 216,400 yuan, and then vanished from the Bitcoin forum.
In early 2015, the price of Bitcoin dropped to 900 yuan, and his story once again became a topic of conversation, filled with mostly schadenfreude and mockery.
In June 2016, the price of Bitcoin rebounded and broke through several levels, and unexpectedly, 'Brother 480,000' reappeared on the forum, feeling hopeful that he might break even.
But who could have predicted that at the beginning of 2016, when the price of Bitcoin broke through 3,000 yuan, he chose to sell his 100 Bitcoins, ultimately losing 180,000 yuan and decisively leaving the market!
In 2017, during the peak of the Bitcoin bull market, the price once broke through 140,000 yuan. 'Brother 480,000' must have been heartbroken, as he completely withdrew from the forum, deleted his posts, and canceled his account.
What a lamentable story this is! The protagonist in the story, like the doomed hero Xiang Yu, stands by the banks of the Wu River, facing a choice. One wrong step leads to total loss. By refusing to cross the river and giving up the possibility of a comeback, he is left with eternal regret.
The regret of 'Brother 480,000' is equally intense and heavy, making one unable to help but sigh and lament the unpredictability of fate.
On January 30, 2025, Bitcoin broke through 106,000 dollars, meaning that 'Brother 480,000' would have had 10.6 million dollars if he had held onto those 100 Bitcoins, which is about 77 million yuan.
He is one of the most tragic figures in the crypto world, entering with 480,000 and leaving with 300,000. Fortune once smiled upon him, but he lost his way on the path that happiness had hurriedly approached.
