Bitcoin Forum

Hi guys, this is just a thought of mine,
for example, if own lots bitcoins and i died and there is no one that i know who have access to my bitcoin
then all of it will be a lost right?

so my question is what if in the future, it happened to many people? then the number of bitcoins will not circulate properly?

am i right or wrong?

did a sr member really just ask this question? It really might be the end of bitcoin

While not beyond the realm of possibility, I would think that most any savvy owner would have the private keys and other means of access stuffed away somewhere for heirs and assigns. I know I would, so the scenario is pretty unlikely.

When bitcoins are lost or gets inaccessible, value of the existing bitcoins in circulation automatically increases. Being infinitesimally divisible (theoretically and practically upto eighth decimal places), supply is never a problem for bitcoin.


LoLz... seems like a purchased account for Sig campaign.

I think his question might be paraphrased: if a not insignificant portion of 'coins' became impossible to retrieve, would that have any real network effect on the blockchain? I don't think it's a dumb question.

Good point. I would think no, as by the time that came to pass, the value would be such that fees alone would be sufficient incentive to mine. But I have nothing but opinion to back that up.

How funny. Satoshi's coins are stuck for so long. What network effect we have faced due to that ? Coins lost means few Tx output will not be used as Tx input anymore. That has no impact on the network at all...

I know. ::)

Your paraphrase is taking his question and making it non-trivial and more intelligent.

For his question, bitcoin can be made infinitesimally divisible like spanishsolider said.

For your paraphrase, I would say it depends on how it happens.

If a significant number of coins are suddenly lost, it may cause some consequences. I'm not sure what they will be, but probably not good.

If coins are slowly lost naturally, then bitcoin's value will simply rise naturally. No harm done.

Although there is the problem with us not being able to know exactly how many coins are lost; that makes pricing bitcoin quite difficult.

thank you so much for rephrasing my question, i am not good at speaking in english
i was just wondering about what would happen if many bitcoin would be inaccessible.

because i have a wife who i would like to teach about bitcoin but she doesn't want to learn it
so therefore i am worried if many people have the same problem as mine

While we can never know how many are lost, we can still have proper market signals. If people are unwilling to part with those that remain at X value, then bids will go up to Y value. The market will compensate. That part in my opinion is simply self correcting. Whether a large chunk visibly going out of circulation would affect the block chain, that I have no real theory on. I tend to think it would not.

well i thought bitcoin will be stuck after 21million has been mined? therefore there will be no more bitcoin will be mined right?

i believe thats why we can't feel the loss of satoshi's coins because mining still continues. but my concern is if in the future, many of these instances happens. i think there will be a great impact

Ya. If everyone would go ahead and stop quoting my spelling mistake, that would be great.  :P

hey hey please don't insult me, because not everyone is as wise as you
i have been here for a long time and i am doing my best to learn more about bitcoin

please have respect, thank you! :D

You make a good point. But I wonder if Satoshi suddenly came out today, and threw all his coins in a provably irretrievable address, I wonder if that would do anything to the price. Well, actually this isn't really a good example, since people might panic because Satoshi threw away his coins, not because there are less coins in circulation.

But if Satoshi made it clear he doesn't have access to the 1 million coins or whatever, I wonder if bitcoin's price would be higher today? Obviously we'd never know. But I still wonder if the possibility of Satoshi crashing the market is priced into bitcoin right now. If we knew for certain that can't happen, how will that change things? Who knows.


@BlindMayorBitcorn:

You're "becaming" famous :p

thank you everyone for answering my question, i think i will close the thread now. i have learned many things because of you guys! Great JOB! :D