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The
BBC reported on Monday that Wright gave some technical proof
demonstrating that he had access to blocks of bitcoins known to
have been created by bitcoin's creator.
Unmasking Nakamoto could be significant for the future of
bitcoin, a computer-generated, digital alternative to other
currencies that has attracted the interest of banks,
speculators, criminals and regulators.
Researchers believe Nakamoto may be holding up to one million
bitcoins, which is worth about $440 million, and the price of
the cryptocurrency could plunge if that was to be unloaded.
Wright declined requests from The Economist to provide further
proof that he was Nakamoto.
"Our conclusion is that Mr Wright could well be Mr Nakamoto, but
that important questions remain," The Economist said. "Indeed,
it may never be possible to establish beyond reasonable doubt
who really created bitcoin."
The BBC said prominent members of the bitcoin community had
confirmed Wright's claim. "I was the main part of it, but other
people helped me," the BBC quoted Wright as saying.
Hopes that bitcoin would become broadly used helped buoy its
price to more than $1,000 in December 2013, when its market
capitalization was $13 billion.
But the market cap has retreated since then, to about $7 billion
currently. Bitcoin fell more than 3 percent after news of
Wright's claims, from $454.89 to below $440, before recovering
slightly.
Wright told The Economist he would exchange bitcoin slowly to
avoid pushing down its price.
"If Mr Wright is in possession of Satoshi's original nearly one
million bitcoins, he will be for sure closely watched by
investors trying to guess his future moves," Tomas Forgac, who
runs bitcoin startup Coin of Sale, told Reuters.
HOME RAIDED
In December, police raided Wright's Sydney home and office after
Wired magazine named him as the probable creator of bitcoin and
holder of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of the
cryptocurrency, which has attracted the interest of banks,
speculators, criminals and regulators.
The treatment of bitcoins for tax purposes in Australia has been
the subject of considerable debate. The Australian Tax Office (ATO)
ruled in December 2014 that cryptocurrency should be considered
an asset, rather than a currency, for capital gains tax
purposes.
On Monday, the ATO said it had no comment while police were not
immediately available for comment.
In a blog post dated Monday, Wright appeared to out himself as
bitcoin founder by posting a technical explanation, including
examples of code, of the process by which he created the
currency. He thanked all those who had supported the project
from its inception.
"This incredible community’s passion and intellect and
perseverance have taken my small contribution and nurtured it,
enhanced it, breathed life into it," he wrote. "You have given
the world a great gift. Thank you."
However Wright did not make a clear admission that he was
Nakamoto. "Satoshi is dead," he said. "But this is only the
beginning."
Unlike traditional currency, bitcoins are not distributed by a
central bank or backed by physical assets like gold, but are
"mined" by users who use computers to calculate increasingly
complex algorithmic formulas.
If Wright is Nakamoto he "is now the leader of a movement", said
Roberto Capodieci, a Singapore-based entrepreneur working on the
blockchain, the technology underlying the currency.
That movement ranges from libertarian enthusiasts to banks
experimenting with cryptocurrencies, all of which pay homage in
some way to Nakamoto's writings.
Top of the list of outstanding issues is the future of bitcoin
itself, where two groups are debating over changes to the size
of the blocks in the blockchain, the digital ledger that stores
transactions.
"He may help to settle the issues internal to the bitcoin
community: block size and new node protocols," Capodieci told
Reuters.
(Additional reporting by Matt Siegel in Sydney; Editing by Nick
Macfie and Raju Gopalakrishnan)
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