Spanish Institute To Promote Forgotten $10K Bitcoin Stash For $10M

A Spanish analysis institute is ready to money in on a forgotten $10,000 Bitcoin purchase from 2012 that’s surged 1,000x to $10 million

The Institute of Expertise and Renewable Energies (ITER), run by the Tenerife Island Council, acquired 97 BTC over a decade in the past as a part of a blockchain analysis mission, in line with a report by the Spanish-language newspaper El Día.

Tenerife’s innovation councillor Juan José Martínez mentioned the council is now finalizing plans for the sale with an authorized Spanish monetary establishment. Proceeds will fund new ITER analysis, together with work on quantum applied sciences.

Analysis Institute’s Bitcoin Stash Skyrockets 100,000%

Bitcoin’s value has soared since 2012, leaving the institute with a 100,000% enhance on its funding.

BTC value (Supply: CoinMarketCap)

In early October, when Bitcoin’s value reached a brand new all-time excessive (ATH) round $126,198, the stash was value greater than $12.2 million. 

Institute’s Bitcoin Purchase Wasn’t An Funding

Martínez informed the information outlet that the 2012 buy was by no means meant as an funding however relatively as a part of an experimental mission geared toward understanding Bitcoin’s underlying blockchain expertise. 

Extra particularly, a computing crew at ITER explored how the Bitcoin mining course of works. 

“It was one of many quite a few analysis initiatives ITER has undertaken to discover and experiment with new technological methods,” Martínez mentioned.

ITER is at the moment working with a Spanish monetary establishment that’s approved by the Financial institution of Spain and the Nationwide Securities Market Fee (CNMV) to facilitate the Bitcoin sale. 

Martinez mentioned he expects the transaction to be accomplished within the coming months. 

Main US Educational Establishments Make investments In Bitcoin

Whereas ITER has mentioned that its Bitcoin buy was not meant to be an funding, different main tutorial establishments have began to put money into the most important crypto by market cap.

Harvard Administration Firm, which oversees the college’s $50 billion endowment, disclosed a $116 million place in BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Belief (IBIT) in certainly one of its current quarterly filings with the US Securities and Alternate Fee (SEC). 

Did You Know?

Harvard College’s portfolio holds extra Bitcoin ETFs than Google shares. pic.twitter.com/iiPWbEr2Cq

— Bitinning (@bitinning) September 19, 2025

The funding offers Harvard oblique publicity to Bitcoin’s value actions by way of BlackRock’s regulated spot BTC ETF (exchange-traded fund). It’s additionally one of many college’s prime 5 publicly disclosed fairness positions, behind Microsoft, Amazon, Reserving Holdings, and Meta.

Harvard’s funding got here after US spot Bitcoin ETFs acquired the regulatory inexperienced mild for launch in 2024. They’ve since attracted billions of {dollars} in funding, and provides conventional buyers a well-recognized automobile to achieve BTC publicity.

Of these ETFs, BlackRock’s IBIT has been the preferred, and has attracted $63.34 billion in cumulative inflows up to now, in line with information from Farside Buyers. 

US spot Bitcoin ETF flows (Supply: Farside Buyers)

Brown College additionally reported that it held roughly $4.19 million value of IBIT shares as of the center of this 12 months. Earlier this 12 months, the College of Austin in Texas introduced a devoted $5 million “bitcoin fund” inside its endowment. The proceeds can be held in BTC for no less than 5 years. 

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