Bitcoin block 170 includes an early transaction with a 10 BTC output. Its header records January 12, 2009. Inspect the block.
A test between collaborators
In Bitcoin and me, Hal Finney wrote that Satoshi sent him ten coins as a test and that he spent the following days reporting bugs. He described himself as the recipient of the first bitcoin transaction. Finney’s account.
Here, “first transfer” means the early person-to-person payment described in that account. Earlier coinbase transactions already existed: they created mining rewards rather than spending outputs from another transaction.
Two sources, two kinds of evidence
The block record establishes transaction data. It does not include a verified real-world name for every participant. Finney’s recollection supplies the personal attribution. Keeping the two distinct is part of reading this history accurately. Block 170 · Finney’s recollection.
Follow what happened next
A payment test and a purchase are different milestones. The later pizza trade supplies a public record of someone using bitcoin to obtain physical goods. Neither story needs exaggerated claims to explain why participants found the experiment interesting.