How to destroy bitcoin (and what happened to that 107 BTC)
In May 2026 someone deliberately destroyed 107 BTC. Here's how burning bitcoin actually works, and what the chain says about where they came from.
Hey all.
On 25th May, five near-identical transactions sent 107 BTC - about $8.3m at the time - to a burn address. The coins are still on the ledger, still sitting in the UTXO set of every full node, and they’ll never move again.
This story fascinated me at the time, and so I’ve written up how the process actually works: why 1111111111111111111114oLvT2 has no private key, some clues as to motive in the on-chain data, and why OP_RETURN is a tidier way to burn coins if you're ever so inclined.
👉 How to destroy bitcoin (and what happened to 107 burned coins)
My favourite part’s the interactive tool in the middle: it generates genuine keypairs, hashes them, and shows you how far off you are from unlocking that 107 BTC. Good luck.
As always, hit reply if you have thoughts. And if you know someone who’d enjoy it, forward it on.
Thanks all, keep stacking.
- Bennet