Science

Student Forgot $27 Bitcoin Investment—Years Later, It Made Him A Millionaire

Published on July 22, 2025

Years later, a student who forgot he had spent $27 on Bitcoin for a class assignment reappeared with an astounding fortune.

Though I’m sure it would feel fairly vivid if you were Kristoffer Koch, things like this only happen in our wildest dreams.

At the age of 25, he made the risky decision to invest in the digital realm, which would have been risky in those days.

After reading an old document written by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008—the presumed pseudonymous person or people who developed Bitcoin—he made his curious purchase back in 2009, even though he wasn’t entirely sure about the digital currency.

Koch chose to take a chance and buy 5,000 Bitcoin tokens because he was fascinated by cutting-edge technology.

According to conflicting reports, his initial investment could be anywhere between $22 and $27.

However, Koch just ignored his investment as the years went by, claiming that nothing was really worth buying.

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.”

However, Koch decided to check his account after learning that the valuation was rising four years later.

A staggering $850,000 was presented to him, which is not bad for a cat that costs $27 and has alpaca socks.

He would receive about 22 million times his initial investment back from that same investment, which is currently worth roughly $594.5 million.

Speaking about his score, Koch told local 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.”

Naturally, encrypted wallets are where Bitcoins are usually kept. In a relatable way, he acknowledged that it took him some time to remember the password that would allow him to open the safe and get to them.

When Koch became wealthy in 2013, he took out a fifth of his reserves and, after paying taxes, was able to purchase a luxurious apartment in Oslo.

He would therefore be worth an incredible $475 million if he kept four-fifths of the fortune in his account; this would be a wise investment.