+1 for Szabo - who knows, but he's my lead candidate
My speculation on Bitcoin's origin is that Nick Szabo is merely a mouthpiece for the true genius living chained in shame within the walls of his parent's attic. By combing hospital records I've determined Nick likely has an otherwise unknown older brother, inbred, and grotesquely malformed. Though the sad creature is a horror to behold it is all the more brilliant.
Scandalous guilt drove the family to imprison it at birth, to keep it hid away from the world. Little did they know its financial acumen could not be denied.
The family barely tended to its secret humiliation. Supplied with the barest of essentials (plus an occasional odd math book or two which Nick rummaged from a nearby abandoned schoolhouse), it never learned to speak, only muttering husky grunts. Nick thought the monster knew only gibberish until 18 years had passed. Nick, now living on his own yet visiting infrequently, desperate to communicate with his sibling as an adult, supplied a fresh box of 120-color Crayolas to the man-beast on an early Sunday morning.
From one incongruous eye flashed a glint of light. The creature mewled in delight. Freakish paws grabbed at the box of crayons.
Code poured from its wretched hands with feverish fluidity. The Thing That Shant Be Named growled and snarled as it bore down wax stick to wood floor. Paper tore from the crayons as it scrawled. Magenta, thistle then periwinkle. Plum, shamrock, then apricot. The air was heavy as of burnt candle.
Nick, not entirely sure what the scribblings meant, still understood on some preternatural level he must share it. But what to do? He could not risk the family's abasement, for afterall, even worse than his brother's hideous visage and inbred nature was the fact the creature lived with its mother and liked model trains. The family would be ruined.
Szabo knew the answer almost immediately. It must be shared anonymously with the world. The rest, folks, is financial history.
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