@daily_btc_lore | Daily Bitcoin History Threads

A 22-Year-Old Intern Photobombs the Fed Chair with a "Buy Bitcoin" SignA 22-Year-Old Intern Photobombs the Fed Chair with a "Buy Bitcoin" Sign

He got escorted out of the room within minutes. Seven years later, the sign he scribbled that day sold at auction for over a million dollars.

Live on TelevisionLive on Television

On July 12, 2017, Janet Yellen, then Chair of the Federal Reserve, was delivering the Fed's semiannual monetary policy testimony to the House Financial Services Committee. Live on television, a young man seated directly behind her held up a handwritten sign: "Buy Bitcoin."

The sign belonged to Christian Langalis, a 22-year-old intern at the Cato Institute. He had drawn it on a yellow legal pad with a fine-point pen. Committee rules explicitly forbid holding up signs during testimony, and staffers escorted him out of the room shortly after.

He Had No IdeaHe Had No Idea

Langalis said afterward he had no idea it had gone viral. His phone had died before the hearing even started, since he had arrived so early to secure the seat. He found out what happened only once someone told him, after he had already been walked out of the room.

Bitcoin moved on the moment. CoinDesk reported the price climbed to session highs, trading 3.7 percent higher at $2,418.46 by 2:27 PM Eastern, the same afternoon the sign appeared on live television directly behind the country's top monetary official.

Instant FolkloreInstant Folklore

The image spread everywhere within hours, becoming one of the most recognizable pieces of Bitcoin folklore from the entire bull run era: a hand-scrawled note interrupting a Federal Reserve hearing, physically inserting Bitcoin into a room built to discuss the dollar.

The Sign Outlived the MomentThe Sign Outlived the Moment

Langalis kept the sign in a sock drawer for years. In April 2024, he auctioned it through Scarce City, a bitcoin-only marketplace, at Pubkey Bar in New York. A pseudonymous bidder known as "Squirrekkywrath" won it for 16 BTC, worth roughly 1.03 million dollars.

Yellen never mentioned Bitcoin once during that hearing. The sign behind her became more famous than anything she said. Bitcoin has almost nothing physical to point to, and for years, a scrap of legal pad paper was the closest thing it had to a relic.

Part of an ongoing series on Bitcoin history. This event falls on July 12, 2017.