18 years of the bitcoin whitepaper. Satoshi wanted money without intermediaries

On October 31, 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto distributed a nine-page bitcoin whitepaper. 18 years have passed.

Today, the network has over 973,000 users. blocks, and there are over 20.1 million BTC in circulation, i.e. approximately 95.7% of the 21 million that will ever be created.

The anniversary falls two days after the largest stock market robbery in history. A good moment to recall what Satoshi started his text with.

On October 31, 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto sent a link to the document “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” to a cryptography mailing list. Nine pages, 12 short chapters and several patterns. The full translation can be read in the text of Satoshi Nakamoto’s manifesto.

Where does a whitepaper start?

The first sentence describes electronic money, which would allow online payments to be sent directly from one person to another without going through a financial institution. The entire document is a response to one problem: how to do without a trusted intermediary.

The anniversary falls two days after approximately $6.3 billion was withdrawn from Binance wallets. According to TRM Labs, this is the largest cryptocurrency theft in history. The attacker did not compromise Bitcoin. According to Binance’s preliminary findings, the attacker took over the laptop of an exchange employee, i.e. the intermediary to whom customers entrusted their coins.

Bitcoin after 18 years in numbers

Data from October 30, 2026:

blocks in the chain: 973,801 (according to mempool.space),

bitcoins in circulation: over 20.1 million, or approximately 95.7% of the limit of 21 million (according to blockchain.com),

network computing power: approx. 1,050 EH/s, average over the last week (according to mempool.space),

bitcoin price: approx. 77.6 thousand dollars, i.e. approx. 304.5 thousand PLN, and the value of all coins is approximately USD 1.56 trillion (according to CoinGecko).

Satoshi dug the first block on January 3, 2009. The reward was then 50 BTC. After four halvings, the miner receives 3,125 BTC per block.

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What is not in the whitepaper

There is no limit of 21 million BTC. The document only says that after a predetermined number of coins are put into circulation, miners will earn a living from fees. The specific number is written in the program code.

It also does not mention the word “blockchain”. Satoshi writes about blocks and the chain of evidence of work done. Who Satoshi himself was, after 18 years, is still unknown.

What does this mean to you

The whitepaper reads in half an hour, and the translation is available in Polish. This is the shortest way to understand why bitcoin was created in the first place.

The conclusion of recent days is practical. Bitcoin works without an intermediary, but only if you hold the keys yourself. In an exchange, the safety of coins depends on its security. How to transfer part of the funds to your own wallet is described in the guide on which cryptocurrency wallet to choose.