Tech investors Halle Tecco and Jeff Hammerbacher invested in Bitcoin back in 2013 when it was selling for around $800. Now that the cryptocurrency has surged more than 2000%, they’re donating the entire portfolio to a South Carolina cancer hospital.
The couple did not say how much the investment is worth, but considering Bitcoin’s price has gone up to $17,000, the donation is estimated at hundreds of thousands of dollars, CNBC reported. Tecco and Hammerbacher’s donation will fund cancer research at Hollings Cancer Center at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, S.C. The hospital will now have to decide whether to convert the Bitcoin donation into dollars.
“We pretty much forgot about it for a few years (the Bitcoin investment) and then this year, it got interesting,” Tecco told CNBC.
Tacco is the co-founder of digital health investment firm Rock Health, and Hammerbacher was a Facebook data scientist and is now an assistant professor at the medical school. The husband and wife duo co-run an angel fund called Techammer. They told CNBC that they wanted to publicize their donation in the hope that it would inspire others to follow suit.
“The investor community that as benefited from the Bitcoin craze should use this foresight (and luck!) to help others. We hope we are just the first,” Tecco told CNBC via text.