Coinbase

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Revision as of 15:46, 26 January 2018 by 934 (talk | contribs) (It only proofs that the article existed at the time the first block of the main chain was generated. Not that any other chain existed before the main chain.)
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For the business, see Coinbase (business).

The coinbase is the content of the 'input' of a generation transaction. While regular transactions use the 'inputs' section to refer to their parent transaction outputs, a generation transaction has no parent, and creates new coins from nothing.

The coinbase can contain any arbitrary data. The genesis block famously contains the dated title of an FT article:

The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks