Bitcoin tycoon promises to give away $86 million worth of bitcoins to charity

If you had a fortune in bitcoins, what would you do with it?

One Bitcoin whale (a term often used for someone who owns a lot of bitcoins) has decided to simply give most of it away to charities.

The anonymous benefactor announced his intentions on Reddit, and launched a site for this endeavor which he had called the Pineapple Fund.

"I remember starting at bitcoin a few years ago. (...) Bitcoin has changed my life, and I have far more money than I can ever spend. My aims, goals, and motivations in life have nothing to do with having XX million or being the mega rich. So I'm doing something else: donating the majority of my bitcoins to charitable causes. I'm calling it 🍍 The Pineapple Fund," he wrote on Reddit.

According to its website, the fund is donating to worthy charities, preferably registered, and not individuals, but exceptions may be made in "exceptional circumstances."

The fund totals 5,057 bitcoins, which is about $86.4 million at today's prices, and it represents the majority of the owner's cryptocurrency holdings.

Of course, with the benefactor being anonymous, it's hard to divulge his or her true intentions, but the Bitcoin address associated with the fund indeed had a balance of 5,058 bitcoins and has sent out a total of 228 bitcoins so far.

So far, the Pineapple Fund has donated $1 million to Watsi, The Water Project, the EFF and Maps, as well as $500,000 to the BitGive foundation.

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So why do all this and remain anonymous? The fund's creator has an interesting explanation in the FAQ.

"The more bitcoin goes up, the more worried I am of my safety. I'd like to live a very low profile life, and most people in my life don't even know the magnitude of bitcoins I have," he wrote.

Correction: This article initially said the donor's bitcoins were worth $86.4 billion. They're actually worth $86.4 million.

Disclosure: The author of this text owns, or has recently owned, a number of cryptocurrencies, including BTC and ETH