Bitcoin turned 16 yesterday. The first cryptocurrency was launched on January 3, 2009

January 3, 2009 can be considered the real birthday of Bitcoin. It was then that the so-called genesis block was mined - the very first block of transactions in the chain of blocks (blockchain) of the first cryptocurrency.

The anonymous creator of Bitcoin under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto added to the first block the headline of the newspaper article from The Times "Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks", which described the British government's preparations for a second round of bailouts for banks affected by the global financial crisis of 2008.

This headline probably emphasized that Bitcoin was created as an alternative to the traditional financial system, in which the government and central banks save financial institutions at the expense of taxpayers.