2008: Pseudonymous developer Satoshi Nakamoto posted a paper describing the bitcoin protocol on the Internet. Nakamoto called it a peer-to-peer, electronic cash system.

2009: Bitcoin network established; first open source bitcoin clients joined the network and first bitcoins issued. Bitcoin creation and transfer is based on an open source cryptographic protocol and is not managed by any central authority. Each bitcoin is subdivided down to eight decimal places, forming 100 million smaller units called satoshis. Bitcoins can be transferred through a computer or smartphone without an intermediate financial institution.

2010: First Bitcoin transactions were negotiated by individuals on the bitcoin forums. One transaction was a pizza sold for 10,000 bitcoins.