When you think of Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, a Russian-Canadian programmer and writer comes to mind. Best known as one of the co-founders of Ethereum, the cryptocurrency coin founded back in December 2013 and currently on a meteoric rise.

Despite the fact that Ethereum's value is lower than that of rival Bitcoin, though, there is a good argument to be made that Ethereum is more important for the crypto and blockchain spaces overall than its larger competitor.

Let's dive into the empowering story of Buterin, how he paved his way into crypto and created Ethereum, and other notable factors.

Early Beginnings of Child Prodigy, Vitalik Buterin

Born in Kolomna, Russia, to Dmitry Buterin, a computer scientist, and Natalia Ameline, Buterin lived there until he was six. His family emigrated to Canada where Buterin was placed into a class for gifted children and was drawn to mathematics, programming, and economics.

He went on to attend the Abelard School, a private high school in Toronto. After graduation, Buterin enrolled into the University of Waterloo which he eventually dropped out after a year of computer science and landed the Thiel Fellowship. He used his time to co-found and work on several startups in cryptocurrency and digital finance. He's also well-known for having an IQ level of 257.

Apart from his academics, he happily played World of Warcraft from 2007 to 2010. However, when Blizzard decided to remove the damage component from his favorite warlock's Siphon Life skill, he sobbed himself to sleep that night. Buterin realized how horrible centralized services could be and he quit World of Warcraft.

At the tender age of 4, most children can be found playing at the local playground or engaging with toy cars and dolls. However, a young Vitalik stood out from the crowd. Rather than indulging in conventional toys, he found himself engrossed in the depths of Microsoft Excel. Astonishingly, even at such a young age, Vitalik demonstrated immense potential in the realms of programming and economics, proclaiming Microsoft Excel to be his ultimate source of amusement.

The Birth of Ethereum

To date, Buterin is currently the world's youngest crypto billionaire. His net worth is estimated to stand at approximately $465 million, with Ethereum's native cryptocurrency, making up a major part of his crypto holdings.

When Vitalik Buterin was just 17 years old, he delved into the world of cryptocurrencies, spurred by his father's introduction to Bitcoin in 2011. With his father's company, which he grew from $0 to $10M, focusing on membership management software, the young Buterin developed a keen interest in the potential of digital currencies. As a student at the prestigious University of Waterloo, Buterin pursued advanced coursework and even had the opportunity to work alongside renowned cryptographer Ian Goldberg, co-creator of Off-the-Record Messaging and former chairman of the Tor Project.

Buterin began writing in 2011 for a publication called Bitcoin Weekly. The website eventually shut down due to insufficient revenue. Later, Mihai Alisie co-founded Bitcoin Magazine with him where he continued to contribute as a leading writer.

He also held a position on the editorial board of Ledger, a peer-reviewed scholarly journal that publishes full-length original research articles on the subjects of cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. Buterin wasn't interested in Bitcoin the first time he heard it and regarded it as a currency with no intrinsic value as doomed to fail.

In 2013, Buterin, who was 19 years old, flew to visit developers in other countries who shared his enthusiasm for code and inspired a movement. He returned to Toronto later that year and published a white paper proposing Ethereum, before the project's launch in 2015.

The project was publicly announced in January 2014, with the core team consisting of Buterin, Alisie, Anthony Di Iorio, Charles Hoskinson, Joe Lubin and Gavin Wood. Buterin also presented Ethereum on stage at a Bitcoin conference in Miami. A few months later, the team decided to hold an initial coin offering (ICO) of ETH, the native token of the Ethereum network, to fund the development. Around the same time, Buterin himself received the Thiel Fellowship grant of $100,000.

The team raised more than 31,000 BTC from the sale of ETH, or around $18 million at the time. The Ethereum team established the Ethereum Foundation, a nonprofit organization based in Switzerland that was tasked with overseeing Ethereums open-source software development. Despite some turbulence, Ethereum’s crowdfunding campaign turned out to be successful.

Death Hoax

In 2017, The creator of the digital currency Ethereum, Vitalik Buterin, died in a car crash and insiders are selling like crazy—or so said the headline. It soon became clear the news, posted to notorious troll site 4Chan, was fake but it still gave the price of the currency quite a jolt.

As Quartz reports, the hoax coincided with the overall market value of Ethereum falling by around $4 billion after the news was posted on Sunday night. Here is a chart from Coindesk that shows what happened to the currency after that:

Buterin himself took steps to quell the false rumors soon after and posted a tongue-in-cheek picture on Twitter. The picture refers to a new use case for blockchain (the technology that underlies Ethereum) and cites a new piece of data from Ethereum to show he is still alive.

Buterin's posting appears to have helped quell the sell-off that followed the fake headline about his death. But the whole episode shows how digital currencies like Ethereum and Bitcoin, which are already volatile, can be subject to market manipulation.

Bottom Line

In conclusion, Vitalik Buterin's continuing involvement with Ethereum amassed him substantial wealth, with an estimated net worth of $465 million. The Ethereum co-founder is also among the largest individual holders of ETH, controlling the 25th largest Ethereum balance according to the Etherscan list.

However, the discussion around Buterin's wealth sometimes overshadows the broader contributions he's made to the crypto space and beyond. While his financial success is undoubtedly noteworthy, it's his technical innovations, leadership, and vision for the future of decentralization and blockchain technology that make him a standout figure in the industry. These contributions cannot be easily quantified but have the potential for a long-lasting impact on how we conduct business, govern societies, and even interact with each other on a global scale.