Bitcoin Budgie Changes Hands for Over $1.1 Million in BTC

Leonidas, the pseudonymous founder of Ord.io, an ordinals explorer, has reported one of the biggest sales of inscriptions, the so-called Bitcoin native non-fungible tokens (NFTs), to date. Leonidas stated that the second inscription on the Bitcoin blockchain had been sold for 24.48 BTC (over $1.1 million), predicting that more sales will beat this record in the short term.

Inscriptions Market Registers Biggest Sale to Date: 24.48 Bitcoin

Ordinal inscriptions, a protocol that allows the representation of images and other data directly on top of the Bitcoin blockchain, are breaking sales records. Leonidas, the founder of ord.io, an inscriptions browser/ explorer, stated the largest ordinals sale ever registered on February 28, when the second inscription in the Bitcoin blockchain changed hands.

This inscription was sold for 24.48 BTC, worth about $1.1 million at the time of writing. The non-fungible token (NFT) is part of the Bitcoin Budgies collection and shows an animation of a cartoon budgie moving its head against a black background. The asset was inscribed on December 19, 2022, for 2,479 sats. The inscription reached its record price in a year and two months.

Leonidas showed his optimism for the future of the ordinals protocol in the short term as part of a looming cryptocurrency bull market. He stated:

1 sat sold for over 1 million dollars for the first time last night. Before this cycle is over I predict 1 sat will sell for over 100 million dollars. Ordinals is just getting started.

There have been relevant sales involving significant sums of money for ordinals before. For example, “Genesis Cat,” a unique piece of the Quantum Cats collection, was sold for $254,000 at a Sotheby’s auction held in January. “Genesis Cat” managed to smash its sales estimate by 6X.

However, inscriptions continue to be at the forefront of a debate that faces two sides, one that considers them an evolution in the usage of the Bitcoin block space and a new enabling technology, and those who believe that it is spam that does not conform with the rules of the Bitcoin network.

What do you think about the largest inscription sale ever? Tell us in the comments section below.