Bitcoin Forum

When someone losts his bitcoin wallet he/she lost his bitcoins and never possible to get it but where goes it? or Can anyone get it or be benefited like traditional currency?

It goes nowhere. There is no way to recover or recycle those coins after someone lose access to them, so they just stay there forever.

Satoshi Nakamoto: "Lost coins only make everyone else's coins worth slightly more. Think of it as a donation to everyone."

Gone forever. It's the greatest tragedy of Bitcoin. Perhaps second only to the rest of us not knowing how many bitcoin have been lost.

There's rarely a way to get your coins back. Now if you forget a password but know the public keys of your wallet, there's a chance you can crack the password. But if you've also lost the public keys and don't have the wallet client on your laptop or something those coins are lost forever.

Keep your password and keys safe!

The greatest thing about Bitcoin is that we all get to be our own bank. And the scariest thing about Bitcoin is that we all get to be our own bank.

Every lost Bitcoin reduces the number of Bitcoins in circulation. The scarcer it gets, the higher the value per Bitcoin. So in a way every Bitcoin owner benefits from this.

I don't think this is true, the impact I mean. For the lost supply to influence demand wouldn't the market need to be aware of it? And the market can never be aware of the lost supply.

Maybe it's the fact that the fraction of people who would have had those coins are no longer participating in the market as sellers that really influences that supply vs. demand equation.

Any economists out there care to comment?


Just noticed this quote, what a clever comment from Satoshi.

Correct. Less accessible Bitcoins lead to a lower market supply. Estimates go up to a few million Bitcoins that have been lost, such as this hard drive holding 7500 Bitcoin (http://money.cnn.com/2013/11/29/news/bitcoin-haul-landfill/index.html). If he wouldn't have lost it, he would for sure have sold at least part of it by now, to live a life in luxory.

Lost Bitcoins can not be retrieved. They will be forever lost. This, according to basic economical theories, will lead Bitcoin to increase its value over time (a.k.a. deflation).


I quote this. Being our own bank has many advantages, but it takes responsibilities as well. Keep in mind this, take care of your seeds, passwords, private keys and act just like you are a bank. Yes, a 'real' bank which should to have strong security measures to protect funds against thieves, incidents and loss.

They are just missed, you can't get something what was bought or own by somebody, so those bitcoins are just "staying" in his pocket.

They go to never never land...gone, lost. That's one reason many think there are much less than the 21 million coin supply. Back when btc was cheap, people were much less careful with how they stored it. There are many stories of people who lost their keys, hard drives, whatever and now don't have their coins. I recommend the Ledger Nano S, if you want to be safe.

gone forever. Important to note though they are never really lost. Only the access to them is lost because you've lost the private key

Exactly, market is only aware of it through the supply/demand of the guy who lost Bitcoins. Considering he will not be able to sell the lost coins at some point, this reduces future supply and consequently increases the price. Also, he might want to purchase more coins, because he lost some, so that increases demand and again the price. So lost coins do not influence supply/demand by itself, the guy that lost them does.

when you were lost your wallet bitcoin, of course all your bitcoin which include in your wallet is still exist but nobody can get it

lost forever :) lowers supply which increases the price of other Bitcoins

this thread talk about lost coins, i want ask some question.
1. how to secure our wallet address ?
2. is there any third party software or hardware to secure it ?

thanks i would like to hear from all senior here. because this will protect us from losing our coins.

In my pocket ;D

1. By keeping your private keys / seed ( if electrum ) secure.

2. you could by a trezor/ nano / any other hardware wallet.

Other then that it would be smart to keep your system updated if you use electrum / core, so virus scanners etcetera.

The lost bitcoins remain in the locker system forever, as long as it exists.

But maybe somebody will someday crack their wallet and they will go back into circulation  ;D

Haha if that is true you get like 5% of the earliest bought coins so you are a milionare right now!

Yes a kind of super computer ...why not...
But why the lost BTC if it is not more work to crack the not lost BTC.

For me the best option was, cause now it cant be just implemented, to give some time to use bitcoins that you recently bought like one year, if they are just stay and noone use them they are given to someone. 

They gone, read an article about a guy in the U.K. Who
Threw out his laptop with his keys, worth millions sad but gone.
If only I could find that drive :) : ;)

Whilst the coins are indeed lost and individually the person lost their coins but globally it bnefits everyone because it is the same as burning coins that destroyed coins will never come back and this reduc the maximum amount of coins in turn making them later. It all evens out eventually so it makes little impact but to the individual who lost that coins it makes a huge difference.

The easiest is to always make offline backup of your passwords or phrases. Trusting anything online makes you prone to cyber attacks and the likes. By the way, if owning BTC makes you your bank, why do you want to give the key to your vault to someone else?

Try to keep the wallet keys safe and secure. Always have the habit of regular backups.

P.S. The coins are never lost. Only access is lost.

Most Bitcoins lose their novice users through poor portfolio security and by using fake bugs. You must not be gullible, because there is a fraud on every corner.

This gets under the list of lost coins. Those coins add up to the market volume and gets considered with the holding. So this won't affect the growth or price of the bitcoin. Its better to keep it in a secure manner and make use of it rather than making it go useless. Enhancing the security is the one that makes it usable.