The "Satoshi Era" Bitcoin Address Sees Activity After 14 Years, Suggesting Some Dormant Wallets May Still Be in Original Owner's Hands

BlockBeats News, June 6th – An address from the "Satoshi Era," holding 35.55 bitcoins (approximately $2.54 million) that has remained untouched since March 2011, made a transfer this week. This transfer is seen as one of the first visible responses from the defendants in a New York lawsuit involving around 3.8 million bitcoins (valued at around $285 billion).

On-chain data shows that on June 2nd, the address transferred 15 BTC to a new address, while keeping the remaining 20.55 BTC as change. The address initially received the bitcoins on March 27, 2011, when the price of BTC was less than $1.

In March of this year, a plaintiff using the pseudonym "Noah Doe" jointly with two Wyoming LLC companies filed a lawsuit in a New York state court, attempting to claim ownership of around 3.8 million long-dormant bitcoins under New York's unclaimed property law and positioning themselves as the "discoverer." The court approved the sending of on-chain notices to the relevant wallets through the Bitcoin OP_RETURN field. In July 2025, the advisory firm Salomon Brothers Strategic Advisors sent dust transactions to 39,000 wallets, including the above address, with a legal notice link, requiring the holders to prove ownership within 90 days.

Alex Thorn, Director of Research at Galaxy Research, pointed out that this address corresponds to the 38215th defendant in the case, stating, "Clearly, these bitcoins have not actually been abandoned."

In addition, another address inactive for 15 years, 1CDSyXAQxro4FPUoqAQb81642ruqDsUiNp, also moved 20 BTC (about $1.48 million) on the same day, but this address did not appear on Noah Doe's lawsuit list.

Analysts believe that the on-chain movements mentioned above indicate that some of the bitcoins from the Satoshi Era, which were considered "abandoned assets," are still under the control of the original holder.