New York Court Accepts Case to “Claim Bitcoin from Dormant Addresses Including Satoshi Nakamoto,” Worth a Total of $274 Billion

Odaily News Galaxy stated that in March of this year, the Supreme Court of New York State quietly accepted a lawsuit seeking to establish ownership of over 3.7 million Bitcoin (worth approximately $274 billion) associated with 39,069 Bitcoin addresses. This includes addresses belonging to Bitcoin founder Satoshi Nakamoto (21,744 addresses holding 1.09 million Bitcoin, valued at $83.7 billion at current prices).

The plaintiff is Noah Doe (a pseudonym) along with two unnamed Wyoming limited liability companies. Noah Doe requests the New York Supreme Court to declare, under the New York State Abandoned Property Law (Article 7-B of the Personal Property Law) via a declaratory judgment action (Article 3001 of the New York Civil Practice Law and Rules), that they own these dormant addresses.

In short, they are attempting to get a New York court to rule that Bitcoin belonging to founder Satoshi Nakamoto (along with Bitcoin from many other lost addresses) constitutes abandoned property, and that they are legally entitled to own it for having "found" these cryptocurrencies. Between June 30 and July 10, 2025, they sent "disposal notices" via OP_RETURN to each address they identified.

However, even if they win completely, they would only obtain a court declaration. They would not receive any private keys and would be unable to transfer any Bitcoin from these addresses. But Galaxy points out that the real value of a New York judgment lies in its ability to act as a "title defect." If any of this Bitcoin appears at a regulated venue, plaintiff Noah Doe could use the document to raise objections with the exchange or custodian.