Bitcoin Forum

How will the distribution look like in 10 years?

11%

do you mean the % of humans on the planet, or the % of bitcoin users?

it's impossible for more than 0.295% of the world population to ever have 1 bitcoin, so if bitcoin becomes mainstream, everyone with 1 bitcoin will be the top 0.295% at the least.

but this is assuming 21 million people all have 1 bitcoin, but of course some people have more than 1 bitcon, and many people have less.

so in reality, even less than 0.295% of the world population will have 1 bitcoin. The distribution may be something like this

Top 20% (of world population)
owns about 0.011 (11 millibitcoin) on average. (note that this is the UPPER CLASS)

they have a total of about 15 million bitcoin combined

High 20%
owns an average of 0.0025 bitcoin per person (2.5 millibitcoin)

they have just over 3.5 million bitcoin combined

Middle 20%
average of 0.00075 bitcoin (0.75 millibitcoin)

they have just about a million bitcoin combined (divided over 1.43 billion people!) Note that this is 'middle class'. Having 1 bitcoin would mean you're about 1333 times richer than middle class!

Low 20%
they own just about 200,000 bitcoin combined, each of them having an average of about 0.00015 bitcoin (0.15 millibitcoin)

Bottom 20%

the bottom 1 430 000 000 people will have less than 0.000075 (7500 satoshi) each, their entire 'fortune' is what we now refer to as 'dust'.
The total amount of bitcoin in the bottom 20% of the world will be hardly even 100,000 bitcoin


do you see why many of us think 1 bitcoin would be 1 million+ in value? They are more scarce than you'd think.

Not many. By then, 1 BTC will be so expensive it would be like purchasing a house.

Not few people (more than 0.3%) have money to buy a house.

I guess would be more like buy certain luxury items, that really few people can afford

if ever bitcoin goes mainstream..and hopefull my lone 1 btc don't get hack  :'(

if bitcoin replaces all fiat, it'd be easily worth 20 million by todays standard.

If bitcoin goes mainstream, I would guess less than 1% of the world population will have more than 1 btc. But then, most people wouldn't need more than 1 btc, cos most things they buy would be in ubtc. We could probably buy a car with 1 btc.

1% of world population = 70 millions of people.

There will be 21 millions bitcoin , so more than 1 btc per person for 1% of population is not possible due to something called maths ;)

exactly, that's why 1 bitcoin will be EXTREMELY valuable if enough people in the world start to decide bitcoin is more useful than dollars/euros or credit cards.

and i'm not even talking about other things, as bitcoin can replace much more than just money.

buying 1 car or 1 house for 1 bitcoin is just the beginning

Interesting data by zimmah

Its either bitcoin will be history after 10 years or I will be paying my bills with it.

Just the beginning.

So if 7500 satoshi is a fair amount of coins to have in the future, I can be considered retired.

10 years is too much time in crypto...

Many things will happen, nothing is certain...or BTC vanishes completely or it will spread like a cancer (benign of course :), 50:50 chances.

Quantum computers? 3rd WWar? Total World Economy collapse? Alien invasion? hahah

Cheers

Bitcoin won't be mainstream in 10 years.

If Bitcoin reaches mainstream the percentage of people owning a certain amount of Bitcoin will not remain static but will slowly decline, because generally wealth tends to accumulate in a small group of individuals. You also have to take in consideration that over time coins are lost, which will have an impact once the supply of new coins drys up.

If mainstream adoption occurs, the percentage of people who own 1 Bitcoin or more will be extremely small. A reasonable estimate has been given by zimmah.

the problem is no one knows the fate of bitcoin in 10 years time. The best things we can do now is holding.

well, first of all the data is theoretical and assuming bitcoin becomes world's most influential currency, this may or may not happen, and even if it does happen, it will likely take another 10~20 years. (for full maturity, it's still entirely possible for bitcoin to become worth $100.000 or so within one or two years, in the most positive scenario)

secondly, 7500 satoshi are fine for the bottom 20% of humanity, and are a vast improvement compared to the bottom 20% nowadays, but still you wouldn't be able to stay on par with western standards with just 7500 satoshi. To be safe i'd try to be at least in the middle class range, if you can.

Note that 80% of the world population lives on less than 10 dollars a day ($3650/year) The bottom 20% currently lives on about $1.25/day (456.25/year) (in fact i get more than that on student grants alone, per month!)

The distribution i predicted is less harsh for the poorer people of society, the wealth distribution is much more even than the current distribution, because bitcoin does not rip of the poor nearly as much as fiat does, however, poor people will still exist even with bitcoin, it will just be a little more acceptable for them because they can now engage in global economic activity without having to pay huge fees to western union or banks, or even having no bank and/or not even having the option to sell their labor to the international or even national market.

The best thing is, the poor people will be able to become much richer by providing interesting goods/services to the rich and the only 3 things they need is:
1) Creativity (offer something that does not exist yet in europe/america, but is interesting for us to have)
2) Internet, to promote your product internationally
3) A bitcoin wallet, to accept payment

Rich people (people with many bitcoin) will probably look for such novelty items (or services) just for the fun of it, and the poor people will be able to make himself a little richer by it. The gap between poor and rich will slowly start to fade.

Compared to todays standard, the people who have 7500 satoshi (assuming they either leverage some of their bitcoins by investing it into smart businesses or actually set up something of their own to generate some income) will still be better of than living on $1.25/day, but not so much better that they could survive in western europe with that amount of money.

That is the theory at least. The future may look different, nobody can know for sure.

It's just an indication that even tiny amounts of bitcoin may make you relatively (or absolutely) rich.

Quantum computers are not going to be a problem to bitcoin, they might need to update the protocol a little, but bitcoin will not become worthless.

There have been many posts in the post proving you'd need the power of the entire GALAXY to power a computer that can crack bitcoin, even with the most efficient hardware possible, on the atomic level. So quantum computers won't be a problem. And even if they can somehow crack SHA256 (which i doubt), they would more likely attack banks and cloud storage before cracking bitcoin. So your money is not safe anywhere in that case. And we'd likely fall into complete anarchy if that were to happen. So even non-digital money (assuming that still exists by the time SHA256 is cracked) would not be safe.

WWIII, may happen, and maybe sooner than we think. If it's good or bad for bitcoin, remains to be seen. In my opinion, it may be bad on the short term, but good in the long term, especially if the dollar loses much of its power, regardless of america losing/winning the war.

Total economic collapse, probably good for bitcoin, depending on the speed at which it happens. If it happens so fast people can not buy bitcoin, than it's useless, but in that case we won't have any money at all, so we'd look for alternatives. Once the world finally rebuilds, we may consider bitcoin again, as we may have learned from our mistakes in the past.

Alien invasion, even if that happens, we will not know the effects. Not on bitcoin, not an any aspect of life. Knowing our governments, they would likely hide the fact that aliens ever visited us, and try to either diplomatically or by force get technology from them, and keep it for themselves. Especially military technology (alien spacecraft, weapons (both biological and firearms or more advanced weaponry), computer hardware and software, etc). Even if it somehow leaks, or if aliens roam around the earth, many people who are scared or stupid may be very racist toward them and anger them, and it may lead to all out war with aliens, which we will probably lose because aliens who invented ways to get here from large distances are probably way more advanced than we are.

I hope i can retire with my btc, its my only hope, the rest is just depression and missery.

 
Re: In 10 years, when BTC is mainstream what % of people will own 1 BTC

answer is: less than 1%.


 So, it would only be prudent and sage to speculate as much as is affordable
to hold them long term. Even $40 speculated for the long term might prove
just as wise as investing in Warren Buffet's stock decades ago.

 It's just silly not to dip one's toes into at least some "bits" of a bitcoin.

 But it would seem much more wise if possible to own and retain sole
possession of at least a single, whole bitcoin, if possible.

 Dollar-cost-averaging ones way in is one of the wisest methods of venturing
into any investments, currencies included.

 Even as little as $40 placed into bits of a bitcoin could end up being worth
more than one could likely fathom in a single decade.

 Invest in one's future. Or be a fool. Diversify and hedge your investments.

 Pay yourself first by investing for your long term future benefit.

 And learn to NOT trust anyone else to retain control or possession of your
own bitcoins as soon as possible. i.e. Be Your Own Bank with your bitcoin(s).


Caveat emptor - let the buyer beware!
 

Indeed, if youve been here for a while and still dont own 1 btc.. you are doing it wrong.

dreams, dreams, dreams  :(

Lets dream.

This is an interesting question. If bitcoin becomes heavily adopted, many late comers won't have more than 1 bitcoin I think. However, bitcoin needs to survive for 10 years without anything replacing it and needs to become more common. Lets hope it continues on an upward trend.

Value is made up of dreams.

Lets dream together.

Very little people will own 1 btc ever.

The whole process of distribution for the last year reinforces bitcoin state as nothing more than a Ponzi scheme. When the distribution is skewed very badly towards early adopters, they will have almost total control over the market. There are 47 individuals own 28.9% of the approximately 12 millions Bitcoins in existence so far and another 1000 own 21.5%, meaning that a slightly more than 1100 people control half of the entire market cap of the digital currency. And total about a million people own $10,000 or less worth. Those shareholders could manipulate arbitrarily. I think I'll keep my money elsewhere....

in 10 years, let's say 1BTC = 10,000$  :D :D :D
% of people having 1BTC = 20% in USA, 0.1% in the all world

August 3, 2012: 46% of senior citizens in the United States have less than $10,000 in financial assets when they die

First of all, this is not what a ponzi scheme is.

Secondly, as the price of bitcoin increases, the early adopters who have amassed a lot of bitcoin will gradually sell their bitcoin. Also as more bitcoin is distributed via block rewards the percentage of the total bitcoin that large holders own will decrease.

You also fail to make the connection between large holding of bitcoin and early adopters. Who is to say that some of these large holders are not independently wealthy and purchased a lot of bitcoin at current prices?

Lastly many of the addresses that have the most bitcoin "in" them are not held by individuals, but rather held by companies that hold bitcoin on behalf of others (mainly exchanges)

These 47 individuals could include the exchanges.

There are many new coins out there, would you take the risk to invest in them?

Oh, look, someone is making more profit than me, it must be a Ponzi.

Hint: look at the dollar. Who's making the most dollars in the dollar system?

Exaclty, the very few people with the exclusive right to create money.

Bitcoin has no such special privileges. Everyone has equal rights in bitcoin.

About 0.05 if my calculations are correct.

The 47 people could also include companies like second market that holds bitcoin on behalf of thousands of individuals, or web based wallets like circle, or the soon to be ETF (COIN) that will hold bitcoin on behalf of likely millions of investors.

In the next 10 years price of BTC could rise over $100K and all the coins will be scattered much more widely than they are now.So ordinary people like us at that time will have a hard time to have 1BTC in hand compared to us now.Just my thought.

Miniscule.
The distribution would be similar to the distribution of any other form of wealth.
A small minority holding the major portion of bitcoin.

So people going to have only few sats instead of bitcoin.
It is good to us ;)

Yeah those long term wealth investors.They won't even leave bitcoin alone.Well I can't blame them opportunity comes rarely.

There will always be people on top. You cant be the new Rothchilds (these are satoshi and the rest of early adopters), but, you can be the equivalent of a small time millonaire. The diference is, the system will not be rigged. There will be no Bernakles.

yes, once more people realize this, they will also realize that $500 is a real bargain.

It's basically investing a minor part of your income now (for many, it's not even a monthly wage) for a chance of having an extremely large share in the future of money.

If you lose, well, big deal, it's just some pocket money you lost.

If you win, you'll be richer than today's millionaires.

You´re being too optimistic....I hope the future be something like this....I can only hope right now.

I just bought some xxxBTCs and will forget them in my wallet for a long time....no ansiety, no pretentions, anything....if it drop so be it...

The actual price flutuation instability is really annoying.

Cheers

where am i being too optimistic?

It's true that you can buy 1 bitcoin for $400ish right now, which, to most people is not a big deal.

It's also true that very few persons can have 1 bitcoin or more, because there will only ever be 21 million bitcoin, and 21 million divided by 7 billion people, is not a lot.

So if bitcoin catches on (and why shouldn't it?) you will be very rich. There are about 12 million people who own a million dollars in the world, there will likely not be 12 million people who own a bitcoin, ever.

So therefore, it's pretty likely that once bitcoin becomes mainstream, the $400 you invest now, might be worth more than a million dollars. (and i don't mean inflated dollars, i mean like today's dollars).

The only thing that can prevent this all from happening, is if bitcoin becomes a failure. But there's no reason to assume that.

And even if bitcoin fails, who really cares about $400? You won't die from wasting $400 once in your life.

I do agree with you and hope Bitcoin become popular and 1,0 BTC will be very valuable.

My fear relies in governments, and, my friend, they have power to block everything by law and fear....BTC must become a lot $$$$ interesting for their adoption, let´s see how the regulation will be, because now we´re in the kindergarden phase, just after the born of the coin (2009).

Just note that some countries already reacted against BTC (Russia, Bangladesh, Equador), others are seeing BTC as a threat (i.e. UK), one thing is certain: They must control the coin somehow or they will react against it.

Cheers

this is correct from the math standpoint, but cannot be correct from the social standpoint.
0.01BTC is way too small amount for the top 20%. BTC has to be at $10-50 mil for it to be possible from the social standpoint. There are other possible solutions:
1. bitcoin derivatization like fractional banking system where there will be a <home>coin that will be derived at 1:100 from btc, people will use homecoin, but banks will hold certain percentage of btc against the value of homecoin.
2. more than 21 mil will be printed/mined.
3. a coin with more than 21 mil units will take over.

But why. Bitcoin is divisible enough.

It is true that people with large positions have quite a bit of control over the market. Although this is true with all things such as the stock market where large shareholders have a lot of power to move the markets as well.

None of your options makes sense.

0.01 bitcoin may sound small, but it can't be much higher because simply, there is not more than that to go around. And there won't be, that's the point.

Deravatis and fractional reserve is very bad for bitcoin and it will not and should not happen on a large scale with bitcoin. The philosophy of 'if you don't own the private key, you don't own the bitcoin' needs to stay strong.

Also, they will probably count in satoshies by then. Because 1 bitcoin would be so extremely expensive that it's not practical to count in bitcoin. You might as well count in the number of ferraris you own.

So, rich people will own millions of satoshi, while average people own a couple of thousands or hundred thousands. So there's no problem in only having 21 million full bitcoin, because we can just count in fractions of it.

For 0.01 to be valuable, we'll need to see a level of adoption to the point entire salaries are paid in BTC. Unless we see a full economy going based on Bitcoin (with jobs paid in BTC, and BTC not being a fucking crazy rollercoaster), and we see this at a massive scale, then maybe someday 1 BTC puts you on a pedestal. By then you'll probably be on a casket tho.

I don't have as much much grasp of the future as you extoll, but you cannot stop derivatization as soon as you have an ETF (upcoming COIN, BIT). Do you think GLD ETF really have gold (as much as they should-I seriously doubt this).

There are usually checks and balances to ensure this.
If they do not have enough gold, and gold price moves up, they may not be able to give the investors necessary returns.

i think this will happen within 10 years, 20 max.

i dont plan on dying that soon.

as for the ETF, it's easier to prove you have bitcoin, than to prove you have gold.

People could and should demand proof of ownership.

Yes. The trustees of the ETF will not issue shares unless there is gold to back up the shares. If they did not have the associated gold then they would be charged with fraud

This sounds like basically the lottery to me. And we have greater chances to die poor if we are supossed to wait for BTC to go 1 million dollars.

Maybe 2-3% of the world.