Searching for Satoshi

The Mysterious Disappearance of the Bitcoin Creator

On January 3, 2009, a secretive software engineer with the pseudonym "Satoshi Nakamoto" launched the world's newest monetary invention: a cryptocurrency called bitcoin. Just over two years after bitcoin was introduced, Nakamoto vanished, with over one million bitcoin to his name. The mystery inventor's worth has reached as high as $70 billion, but not a single one of those bitcoins has ever traded hands or moved from Nakamoto's online wallet. After sending a few cryptic emails stating he "may not be around," Nakamoto went silent and has not been heard from since early 2011. Why did Nakamoto disappear? Some have speculated that he may have taken his own life. Or maybe he wanted to wash his hands of his bitcoin project, walking away from it all and maintaining his anonymity. In this film, director and producer Paul Kemp goes on a worldwide journey to piece together the most compelling case yet for who Satoshi Nakamoto was and why he disappeared.