History

The Pineapple Foundation was announced with a post on Reddit on December 14, 2017. The individual used the pseudonym “Pine”, and explained that “My aims, goals, and motivations in life have nothing to do with … being the mega-rich. So, I am doing something else: donating the majority of my bitcoins to charitable causes. The individual behind the fund has remained pseudonymous.

An application form was made available on the website, open to all charities around the world. Speaking to the magazine Philanthropy, the founder said that more than 10,000 applications were received.

After five months, a total of, 5,104 bitcoins had been donated and liquidated for a value of $55 million after exchange rate volatility.

Donations

The fund's first donation was $1 million to Watsi, a charity for crowdfunding healthcare. The fund made its three largest donations of $5 million each to GiveDirectly, The Open Medicine Foundation, and MAPS. The fund has also donated $1 million or more to organizations such as BitGive, Internet Archive, SENS Research Foundation, and the Sustainable Ocean Alliance.