Bitcoin Forum

One thing always came on my mind when I entered the world of Bitcoin.
Fiat are issued with registered numbers and recycles in the name of new currency, making the old obsolete.
i.e. They never get destroyed even if the physical notes gets burned and decayed.

But bitcoin are totally different, they can be lost
- sending to unsupported address
- loosing private keys
- people dying with private keys, etc.
Which will keep on decreasing the total available supply of the coin. making it more scarce.
Won't that bring a problem the the economics, no coins left to trade situations?

We will prevent that by back up our accounts and make sure that we manage to know them well. Because the most reason why accounts were lost is because of forgotting them example you forgot the password and etc. But in terms of coin lost that due to unexplainable reason, I can't assure what going on. Maybe you have been hacked, its possible. As a member here I am careful with my move because I know bitcoin is hard to earn.

It would be an issue if there was enough Bitcoin being lost, but for most cases Bitcoin isn't being lost at insane rates and most people are able to keep their wallets in line due to spreading awareness about backups, the use of online wallets (which shifts responsibility from users, who may be prone to issues, to a company which -has- to maintain their stores otherwise they start to lose a lot of money quickly), and the experience of the community growing as a whole. More people know to keep their stuff backed up, but it could potentially damage the amount of Bitcoin over a long enough time frame. So far it isn't an issue.

It's the sender's responsibility to know on what the address he is sending. And this is rarely happening since most of the bitcoin users know that every transaction should be handled with care.


You can't lose private keys unless you save it on a file and put it on your flash drive and lock it to your drawer or you can simply write it on a piece of paper and clip it on a folder on your table office.


I don't understand this.


It's given as bitcoin has supply limit.


You should understand on how this thing works, it doesn't mean when bitcoin is not mineable anymore and it's supply limit was reached. The circulation of coins in the market is there and I doubt it there will be no left for trading.

But one BTC property that is often overlooked is that its also divisible by 8 decimal places. So how can you say that there is going to be no coin left to trade? There will be quadrillions or more left.

Dont worry about the supply, BTC1 is worth 100 million satoshis.

Well the problem is how to regulate and control all those bitcoin that have already scattered around the web. I cant sense the no coin left to trade situation because as we all know how much is in store for btc.

Maybe before when the value of bitcoin is not that significant then people wouldn't care that much if their coin will be lost but the situation now where only the people who have much money can directly buy one bitcoin then we would be careful in our coins because it is quite valuable. Doing the necessary things like backing up your keys would prevent you from losing your coins so the possibility of affecting the bitcoin world because of the coins that are lost is less likely because many people will take care of it being afraid of losing their hard earned money.

This is considered a Human error and this would be an epic and rare situation though. Like many people bought their bitcoins way back from the early stages of bitcoin and forgot their addresses or private keys and never had a chance to recover it. But just like what i've said this is really a rare thing to happen, i think it is not possible to affect the active coins from the forgotten ones and maybe Bitcoin developers can do something about this concern and might come up with a better solution.

Of course this is an issue. But only if you look at BTC as a "currency" for everyday transactions. But for what we are seeing now, BTC is not heading that way. It is not looking to have the price stability a currency need. so It´s become more of a store of value asset, while we keeping believing in the tech. For that , being the smaller unit a satoshi i think we will have enough for a long time before the "lost" coins become a problem.

All the things that you mention about the problem in bitcoin are all individual error about people who are careless with whom they will send their bitcoins, backups their files and in regards to people who dies and their bitcoin being stucked in where they put it I think it will be also consider a human error because they can safe it also to the one they would trust their private keys.

That is really a real problem we encountered by now the scarce of bitcoin because of those errors hope they're is a way that it will be back especially if it has huge amount stuck out there.

See it as gold.

No, this will not be a problem as BTC can be traded xxxxx behind the dot.

It's rare that you can send bitcoin to unsupported address. But now you should be aware that you have to double or even triple check the address before sending it to anyone. If you do send it to a wrong and unsupported address, its your fault not bitcoin. Again, you need to backup your seeds and your private keys because this is the first thing that you will be aware once you are into bitcoin. There are about 21 million bitcoin and so far 16 million are on the circulation. So there's still a lot of bitcoin for everyone. Its gonna be scarce but this will make bitcoin more valuable in the future. Because there will be a huge demand but the supply is getting scarce.

there are about 18 millions bitcoin around the world right now but only 3 millions are traded and used. More than 15 millions bitcoin have lost cause of many reasons such as losing private key, do not remember password, etc. However, it is not a big issue, with 3 millions bitcoin, we can still have a better place and people still want to own bitcoin as many as they can

Bitcoin is a one type of currency and it's called digital currency.It is  rare that you can send bitcoin to unsupported address. But now you should be aware that you have to double or even triple check the address before sending it to anyone. And this type of mistake make a bitcoin loss

I don’t think so that bitcoin will loss in the near future. If get much success in the many advance countries and trying to achieve the peak position. Bitcoin loss will cause a panic among the many people lives. Many people will jobless and thus the economy will show grater change in short time.

That is a subject well known here. I have seen some people talking about it and I think lost Bitcoins aren't a problem. The supply will surely be lower, but it makes the coin more valuable and "rare". So BTC price can be bumped even more on long term as we know there are many coins that will be lost for several reasons. But I think before (in the past) people have lost more Bitcoins than now because Bitcoin wasn't so popular, so people didn't give much importance to it.

In order to understand bitcoin, people need more advance about compare when they learn on fiat which much easier to understand.
In this digital era, there many invention that being made and bitcoin one of them so we need learn more advance too in order to understand how bitcoin really work and preventing bitcoin losses on the future

I don't think the supply of bitcoin will be scarce by then, and I'm sure for some of those thinking of passing on their bitcoins had already figured out if the die who would get a hold of their bitcoins. I even had planned out myself that already, I'm passing all of my hodled coins to my daughter if in case I die.

I think you are aware of this trend then you can never face a loss project, Bitcoin is becoming a popular and profitable platform, day by day Bitcoin price is getting higher so that bitcoin could be one of the most profitable platforms. that is why Bitcoin could not be a loss project.

Your last question though isn't going to happen. There will always be some coins to trade with. All 21million coins can't be lost. Not possible. But before the other worries you raised become a nagging problem the issue would've be taken care of. I see a possibility of countries harnassing the blockchain technology into their financial systems and making Bitcoin holders keep records of transactions through the banks. Yes, this will happen in the near future as countries embrace Bitcoin as legal tender.

According to Satoshi himself, we should be thankful to the lost coins as they are the ones who bring more value to bitcoin due to scarcity. Also, it won't bring any problems at all; it is improbable that all coins would be lost in existence except if there would be a scenario where all our machines (and the internet of course) would be wiped out and be rendered useless. Not too much to worry about the diminishing supply as your current coins are being valued more due to these lost coins.

Not yet bitcoin is not going to lose it ya future of the money it will use to all counters. It's a future digital currency so it will use full the any bay bill and any purchase the product. Most of the people he doesn't know how to use the bitcoin and how to handle the process and enabling the process. Bitcoin give more information about the economy and finance process. So it's a growth for the future.

This is exactly the cause which many government are facing due to which I think due to which many countries have not yet legalized or banned it. Probably they would be thinking that this should be under their control so that its can be easily regulated and keep a track.  

Also if few counties start to accept it then the value of each decimal upto 8 will have the good value in future and people would be easily be able to buy and use the bitcoin against the good and services.

It is such a good information. For me, I don't worry so much about the depreciation of current supply of coins for I know that it will just go back to its own and normal rate. Come to think if all bitcoins will be lost that would really affect many investors. And,if internet connection becomes weak,then we can't do anything about that. Could we have an invisible connection to operate? I guess that's too impossible. Let's be all thankful to Satoshi.

Well in the late 2010 year when bitcoin is just a useless and priceless money over the internet, people don't really care if they loss or forget the private key as it is reasonable but as this year emerge, people nowadays are becoming more aware and cautions about this negative traits of bitcoin and prepared to protect their coins against the frauds and scam scattered around the globe of the internet, preparing and researching before going through, awareness is now the basic principle of the people who owns bitcoin nowadays.

Satoshi is right indeed. It would have a deflaitonary effect on bitcoin economy. Its like when you are collector. Then item lost in history the more its valuable. Too bad though that those earlier adopter didn't take care of their bitcoins. They should have been millionaires by now. And this should be a lessons learn for us that is new to bitcoin. Saved your private keys and seeds.

No bitcoin will be lost if you have back up for your files or accounts. We invest in bitcoin knowing the high risk in the business yet we continue to do this, knowing the risk should make us more vegilant on our accounts to make sure it will not be lost.

Each coin is potentially endlessly divisible. Unless you lose all 21 million, it's not going to run out. 1 Satoshi can easily be worth $1k if demand outpaces supply enough.

I think people are trading and investing bitcoin on the liquidity basis that is the bitcoin movement continues everday from one account to another and it does not really stays at one person. The rate of loosing bitcoin seems to be very very less and I believe that will never affect the bitcoin. Yeah only someone die with private keys then it could be problem as that kind of bitcoin can't be recalled at all without that private key. But again how many people will die before they share the keys and also how muc bitcoin they might just be carrying with them.

Will losing those very important things is the end of your happy life if it has a lot money on it. Thats why dont forget to make some back up on it Which is in the safe place do not let your important keys so you will not repent after.cause it cant help. So this post may aware to those who had no back up on their important things such as password, private key or etc to avoid also that problem. And also Unsupported address? i think you can't send a money if the address is unsupported as my experience on my wallet . beacuse it will become red and your wallet will not allow you to procced the process.

I do not think that we will be able to lose access to our coins even if we forget the password for the wallet. Now there are very good hackers who can crack the password and get coins.

I think losing of bitcoin is not that easy. The circulation will never come to an end as long as all the coins are destroyed or may be banned by governments from all the countries. The coin might lose but the value will increase accordingly in long terms. Remember that supply and demands calculation, when the pretty much amount of bitcoin are lost for example, one million may be then only it will affect the market severely. But the effect won't be sudden as due to less one million the rate in the market will increase equivalently leading to increased prices per coin. But surely the effect will be much smaller I believe.

What you have enumerated are the disadvantages of bitcoin and I would just pick the spot where you said "- people dying with private keys, etc."
For this, the solution is just to disclose to someone you trust your keys while you are alive if you feel so. It could be a next of kins as we rightly have in banking setting. So the next of kin which could either be a wife or relatives should be informed by this, there is continuity in the bitcoin you have.

This question is pretty interesting. I have also been thinking about this when i first entered the crypto world. I thought aboit people owning cryptos dying amd not being able to tell someone their keys.  Plus seeing a lot of people that have been saying they lost or forgot their wallets on social media sites, google and in this forum. Only to find out that their posts were dated 2013-16. Which made me realize that this isn’t the case for today because people are more careful with their possessions because of its value.

your reasons not acceptable  Because all back to bad use of user so bitcoin away from that


if you think bitcoin will lose only stop using it and lock your account 

It is nothing to concern yourself with. Decreasing supply just means the value will appreciate. The market will be fine. You will be better off making sure you don't lose your own Bitcoins.

If the bitcoins were lost and the circulating supply were scarce, then the law of supply and demand follows. The value of bitcoin of bitcoin depends on supply and demand, the lesser the supply (scarce), the higher the price. The bitcoin's rule is that the maximum mined bitcoin with a total of 21 million coin is fixed and in any circumstances that supply can not be change. There have been no actual inventory of bitcoin determining the actual quantity that actively circulated of the whole trading platform worldwide. Its market capitalization only tells the total mined bitcoin but the lost or inactive coin had not been accounted.

What you are telling is highly not possible because not all users are immature to not safely keep their wallet so only 50% chances are their and it will only create more demand on the coin as much their will be shortage.

With proper management these mistakes can be avoided. But you are right, we have seen many cases and many stories where large amounts of BTC have been lost for all time.

Yes coins are probably lost all the time and once they are lost, they can't be recovered. At some point, there will be more coins lost every day than mined. I came up with several ways coins get lost.

1) Coins get sent to the wrong address by the sender. Most likely this is an address that no one owns so those coins are gone.

2) The owner either forgets the private key or forgets about the coins and no one knows about them so they are lost.

3) Someone dies and they didn't leave instructions for their relatives to get the coins or the relatives just don't try to get them, so they are lost.

4) Someone has some 'dust' left on an address from a faucet that is worthless now but in the future it has value. The coins are forgotten and therefore lost.

I've got some addresses with dust that it will cost more to move that they are worth right now. They may get lost too.

I haven't seen such case that anyone have send his/her funds to wrong address, people using cryptcurrencies are not that dumb that they will send their funds to any unsupported addresses, it will be a rare case if anyone do this.

Almost everyone have a backup of their wallets, it is not a big problem at all today.

Yes this could be the problem but not a major one, we can tackle with this easily by giving authority to our family members by mentioning it in our will.

Oh sweet summer child, this topic was belaboured to the death before many times. So to sum it all up - this is not a problem at all.
It would be only when we would have 21 millions of Bitcoin and every single one of BTC couldn't be divided into smaller units.
In a situation when 1 BTC is divisible down to 8 decimal places and all calculations are performed in satoshis (1 satoshi = 0.00000001 BTC) we have nothing to worry about.
Bitcoin loss over time is nothing to worry about.

Crack the password of a desktop wallet? No one can does that, if a hacker can crack as your said, why does he not crack Bitcoin wallet of the large cryptocurrency exchange as Poloniex, Bittrex? Every update version wallet is updated and fixed all bugs.

Not everyone dies when it is planned. Definitely will be losing coins. But this does not affect the turnover of bitcoins. The decrease in the number of coins will only lead to imitation. There may be a few million years will be decided on the issuance of commemorative coins but we will not see. In our age of bitcoin enough.

in fact bitcoin is an investment and trading, therefore there are always chances of losing money, Although there are very little chances of losing money by investing in bitcoin but still the possibilities is still there. Therefore it is too much important to be more careful while playing and trading bitcoin or any other altcoin.

- there always a room for error but this could only happen if not double check or being always competent to self. there is only a small case that this happens as what i read in this forum.

- private keys are important, people know that so they always make extra a copy of it.

- there may be case bitcoin holder dies and did not share the key but it is still good for the rest. if bitcoin is in low supply its demand increase and the price increase.

no it will not bring problem when it comes to the economy, many users here are somehow already lost their bitcoins and also it was impossible to lose all those 21 million bitcoin especially they can even be divided for now up to  8 decimal places , bitcoin will not be dissolve just because of the irresponsibility of others.

BItcoin loss is one of the reason why bitcoin is so high. The artificial scarcity is the result of the loss of a whole bunch of satoshis in the depth of the webspace.

If you think about it, such a behaviour is a little scavenge like. It is not much honorable behaviour. But a people including me see that it as ok as bitcoin is just a social experiment. So it is kind of interesting how everything is coming out in the bitcoin world.

Bitcoin can disappear if all those who have bitcoin die and not tell their closest relatives about the password of the wallet he has.

There is no transparency in printing the notes,they can print as long as they want and that is not the case with bitcoin,with the limited amount of coins and considering that more coins are being lost on a daily basis and there is nothing that can be done for that lost coins ,the total availability of coins will be scarce and it indeed will reflect in the price when there is more demand.

it was very discouraging, and angry

Indeed you are right that some bitcoin may be loss but those are very small amount compared to the whole 21 million BTC to be generated.
And as someone already mentioned, if some coin is loss, the value of the rest will increase because of scarcity, simply it is  :)

yeah I once lost 0.3 bch by sending to the wrong address

I am not afraid. This will only increase the demand and price will rise. It seems to me that this issue is not relevant. Have bitcoins there are more important issues that can lead to the fact that we can not wait the moment when coin is not to be missed for everyone.

We don't need to worry for those losses like those scenarios that you said. It is just up to the person who is handling bitcoin on how is he going to make it safe to hold or keep in order to have a good journey for his bitcoins. That is why it is important also to inform the users of bitcoin for those possible scenarios so they can prepare for those situations and avoid it as quickly as possible.

I've never seen this classic argument usually coming from keynesians that say we will go under a deflationary spiral. Well, last time I checked, we have been throught several inflationary spirals, never deflationary. We will find out with BTC since this is the first proper experiment ever of an attempt of a delfationary currency.

I think there's no problem. Less supply = hodlers get richer = if needed we add more digits, but 8 should be enough.

It would really be a problem since bitcoin would really be scarce but talking the real thing that people are not dumb enough on carelessly on their privatekeys and losing their precious bitcoins.There are really instances to lose up those coins but i would say it would really be on small ratio so theres nothing to worried off as long as a bitcoin user we should really know how to keep important things knowing bitcoin is still considered as money.

Sending btc to unsupported or invalid address due to typo is very unlikely because your wallet will detect an error so there will be no transaction created. And nowadays people are very careful not to lose their private keys. If you have thousands of dollars worth of btc in your wallets I don't think you're not gonna make multiple backups for your keys. You're stupid if you didn't.

"People dying with private keys." This statement is quite confusing but I assume you're saying that people who have btc wallets, with btc in it, unfortunately dies and no one even in his family knows his private keys. I think this situation is possible to happen but I don't think it's big of an issue. And that in my opinion it won't be a problem.

There is a mechanism one can retrieve his lost bitcoin through some proper channels and this is really happening a friend of mine has lost his bitcoin but are recovered soon he complained and all of sudden everything become fine on lighter note of death of some investor that is his fault he must have some trust worthy person who can use them after him.

Yes price is totally depending on the demand and production as the demand increases and production get started the coin values starts to rise and as there are more vacant coin in here the price will automatically go down and going down is not loss it is chance to add some no into the wallet and after all this bitcoin gives pump to the prices as new people entered and that’s the working.

Most of us lose because we sell when panicked, new users often experience panic and always want to know price updates so that they are easily exposed to negative issues so that sell bitcoin at any price.

This can happen if bitcoin supplies are very rare.

                       Honestly, these kind of events are some of them considered as human errors, while the last case was unexpectedly an accident. That case has been talked all over the forum since then, it is not an easy problem that you just have to neglect or chill it out, it is a serious turn of events, so what happens if something like that might happen? I think you should have at least put some back up files to your corresponding USB, phones or email, put all the hints, passwords, priv keys and everything else and make it secure for your beneficiaries.

not it ya good for the growth for the future it will give more opertunite. you will get more information and how to work it. Bitcoin will be groth in future and improve your skill and self confidence improve. bitcoin is the digital currency it Price's increase day by day so it not loss.

No it will never happened reality even not in the dreams because millions of people are investing in bitcoins and they are 110% sure that the will have profit and the prices are not getting down they are always going up so there is no possibility of loss.

I am also afraid if coins are getting rare because it will complicate the trade.

I think that you are imagining the thing which could not happen.Some coins may be sent to wrong addresses or private keys may be lost by some people.But it will be of very less percentage and it will not go very high to create a situation of having no bitcoins to use.

Also,its our mistake if we send bitcoins to unsupported addresses.Also,we should keep our private keys safe.

Bitcoin is another form of money and we should treat it carefully as we treat our fiat money.

We have to also comprehend the fact that new users are coming into this system and the possibilities of pumping new coin is so high. So, it will be as if it is a circle and nothing is lost.