Jess Battison
Sometimes we might forget the hiding place of something we’ve put away for safekeeping. Or maybe we forget about the $5 note in our jeans pocket when we put them in the washer.
So, we can’t imagine how this guy felt when he remembered about an investment he’d casually made years ago.
The Norwegian man had completely forgotten about the $22 worth of Bitcoin he’d bought. Very pleasant surprise, to be fair.
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Kristoffer Koch was 25 when he decided to make the curious purchase all the way back in 2009.
He wasn’t so sure about the digital currency but decided to have a good old read of a document written by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008 – who invented it that year.
Koch had a fascination with pioneering technology, so decided to take the chance and procured 5,000 Bitcoin tokens.
Divergent accounts suggest his initial investment ranges somewhere from $22 and up to $27.
But as years passed, Koch simply forgot about his investment.
Binance Feed reports that he had never really intended to actually use those funds in cryptocurrency as he stated: “The sole purchasable items in those days were alpaca socks, thus I proceeded with my life and relinquished thoughts of this venture to instead concentrate on securing gainful employment.”
But four years later, Koch came across reports that the valuation was absolutely surging.
Bitcoin was being used more and more, and his holdings were therefore worth more and more.
So by the age of 29, he realized his was nearing the mega million-dollar mark.
Suddenly, his 5,000 Bitcoins were worth around $850,000.
Koch said in Norwegian media: “Not in my wildest dreams could I have imagined that they would have soared like this.
"It's bizarre, these psychological reflexes that make us attach a value to something that doesn't have any in itself."
Obviously, Bitcoins are typically stored in encrypted wallets. And rather relate-ably, he admitted it took him a while to actually remember the password to be able to unlock the safe and access them.
In 2013, when he got his fortune, Koch cashed in a fifth of his reserves and after paying taxes and was able to buy himself a fancy flat in Oslo.
From curiosity and sceptism to landing an absolute whopper of cash, this is a surprise we wouldn’t mind experiencing ourselves right now.