How many lost Bitcoins are out there?

[ReigningPigs]

Loosing access to a Bitcoin wallet sucks because it is virtually impossible to recover the coins.
Since these lost Bitcoins never get circulated they cause the value of a Bitcoin to change. Do you think something can be done about these lost coins?

[aakashsangwan]

Loosing access to a Bitcoin wallet sucks because it is virtually impossible to recover the coins.
Since these lost Bitcoins never get circulated they cause the value of a Bitcoin to change. Do you think something can be done about these lost coins?

There are same kind of threads asked again and again.
@Op please use the search function in the top right corner of the forum, before creating a new thread so as members will not be answering same question again and again.
Btw no offence OP

[ranochigo]

At least 2k BTC are verifiable: https://blockchain.info/address/1CounterpartyXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXUWLpVr. If satoshi don't appear again, its safe to assume that 1million+ additional BTC are lost. If more BTC were in circulation today, BTC would be much less valuable obviously. Shortage of coins is not a concern since BTC are divisible.

Coins lost after the last checkpoint can be recovered but it is harder for coins lost before the last checkpoint to be recovered, clients have to be changed.Neither of these are feasible. CMIIW.

[HabBear]

At least 2k BTC are verifiable: https://blockchain.info/address/1CounterpartyXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXUWLpVr. If satoshi don't appear again, its safe to assume that 1million+ additional BTC are lost. If more BTC were in circulation today, BTC would be much less valuable obviously. Shortage of coins is not a concern since BTC are divisible.

I disagree, the 1 million aren't lost if the address is known. It's the address owner's prerogative whether they want to spend that coin or not...but the coins aren't lost, they're very much found and visible.

I know some of early coins were earmarked as "test" and essentially thrown away - no one is supposed to have the addresses for those coins. And there's probably a lot of early addresses used for faucets and things that have been forgotten and have relatively large balances.

[shorena]

At least 2k BTC are verifiable: https://blockchain.info/address/1CounterpartyXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXUWLpVr. If satoshi don't appear again, its safe to assume that 1million+ additional BTC are lost. If more BTC were in circulation today, BTC would be much less valuable obviously. Shortage of coins is not a concern since BTC are divisible.

I disagree, the 1 million aren't lost if the address is known. It's the address owner's prerogative whether they want to spend that coin or not...but the coins aren't lost, they're very much found and visible.

I know some of early coins were earmarked as "test" and essentially thrown away - no one is supposed to have the addresses for those coins. And there's probably a lot of early addresses used for faucets and things that have been forgotten and have relatively large balances.

I dont think address means what you think it means. All possible addresses are known whether they have been used or not. The important question is whether or not someone has a private key to be able to spend the coins. This is what is commonly understood as "lost". Its known where they are, they just cant be spend.

[hunnaryb]

adding up the entire orderbook of visible bitcoin on every exchange, including alt exchanges will probably yield very surprising numbers. There's a hellava lot of coins out there that are just sitting off exchanges.

[ranochigo]

At least 2k BTC are verifiable: https://blockchain.info/address/1CounterpartyXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXUWLpVr. If satoshi don't appear again, its safe to assume that 1million+ additional BTC are lost. If more BTC were in circulation today, BTC would be much less valuable obviously. Shortage of coins is not a concern since BTC are divisible.

I disagree, the 1 million aren't lost if the address is known. It's the address owner's prerogative whether they want to spend that coin or not...but the coins aren't lost, they're very much found and visible.

I know some of early coins were earmarked as "test" and essentially thrown away - no one is supposed to have the addresses for those coins. And there's probably a lot of early addresses used for faucets and things that have been forgotten and have relatively large balances.

Satoshi might have lost the private keys and he might have not. All except the 50BTC from genesis block can be spent but with no movement of any of the coins for the past 5+ years, I highly doubt he would have the private keys to though. A private key is needed to spend those 1million+ coins, without them, it is stuck. There are much more lost coins like my poor 0.04BTC but we can't verify those since some are used as cold storage and won't be used for a long time. Of course, nothing is impossible.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I think I have about 13,000 satoshi lost forever on a blockchain.info wallet that I abandoned. 

I lost some LTC and DOGE too. 

[Rabber]

If satoshi don't appear again, its safe to assume that 1million+ additional BTC are lost.

I am wonder is Satoshi has left that in a will to some kind of charity or benevolent fund upon his death, long from now and if hopefully bitcoin is a success.  Maybe he isn't spending them because he didn't do this for the money and doesn't need the money. Spending them now could put possibly harm what he is trying to do with bitcoin.

[NorrisK]

There is a really good thread out there that discusses just this: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=7253.0

The beginning is probably more serious, as it is much harder to believe "losing 15,000 coins" today than it was in the beginning.

[Amph]

the usual estimate say around 3M, probably a bit more or less, but i believe it's a good number to take in consideration, and this without counting the 1M from satoshi

that for all we know they could be lost too

[Rubberduckie]

I think people would be shocked to find out how many are lost.
Think about early adopters / people who just tried it out got
like 100-1000 btc and just forgot about them or threw away
the computer as it stopped working. Yikes I dont want to think
about how many lost coins are out there.

[TastyChillySauce00]

At least 2k BTC are verifiable: https://blockchain.info/address/1CounterpartyXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXUWLpVr. If satoshi don't appear again, its safe to assume that 1million+ additional BTC are lost. If more BTC were in circulation today, BTC would be much less valuable obviously. Shortage of coins is not a concern since BTC are divisible.

Coins lost after the last checkpoint can be recovered but it is harder for coins lost before the last checkpoint to be recovered, clients have to be changed.Neither of these are feasible. CMIIW.

its really impossible satoshi nakamoto just throw his coins or leave it alone,the coins is probably already sold even a bit or satoshi just wanted to keep it until the price going far up

[HarryKPeters]

I've lost some but not a lot. Wrong addresses or 'scams' etc. But when I started I learned from my mistaked and these days i can say with confidence i am not making this kind of mistakes.
For starters checking and saving your wallet (with encryption) is very handy.

[fastdice_alchemist]

Lost bitcoins aren't just ones from lost wallets, but burnt coins (send to addresses that the private key wasn't kept for etc) is quite a big thing. I've burnt 0.2 before ($100 is $100) and it sucked.

[Mr. Forum]

I m very sure there are very many coins that are just heald in the mid air because people have been able to loose or forget their own passwords. This is one thing that usually pose as a challenge to the bitcoins. The inability to recover the lost or forgotten password. I think they need to have a mechanism that will cater for this to avoid a situation where the bitcoins are available but can not be accessed. It is very dangerous.

[Mickeyb]

I m very sure there are very many coins that are just heald in the mid air because people have been able to loose or forget their own passwords. This is one thing that usually pose as a challenge to the bitcoins. The inability to recover the lost or forgotten password. I think they need to have a mechanism that will cater for this to avoid a situation where the bitcoins are available but can not be accessed. It is very dangerous.

Mate this is a danger of being your own bank! I would still rather live with this danger than with the dangers of the financial banking system of today.

But yes, I suppose many coins have been lost. How many exactly, we can guess at best!

[Graphics]

Probably a shit ton. I lost a private key containing half a bitcoin myself.

That's not counting all the "lost" coins from scams, ponzis etc. If you count those, then the figure would be giant.

[ajareselde]

Probably a shit ton. I lost a private key containing half a bitcoin myself.

That's not counting all the "lost" coins from scams, ponzis etc. If you count those, then the figure would be giant.

Coins lost from ponzi's and scams should not be factored in this category, as they continue to circulate, even tho they in a way were taken(scammed away) from you.
imho there's nothing needed to be done with lost coins, it's sort of a natural thing to happen in crypto currencies, and in time, it will only increase the value of the remaining
coins, which in a way is fixing the problem by itself. Coins get lost, but value of them does not, it gets added to crypto/fiat ratio.

cheers

[pereira4]

Probably a shit ton. I lost a private key containing half a bitcoin myself.

That's not counting all the "lost" coins from scams, ponzis etc. If you count those, then the figure would be giant.

Coins lost from ponzi's and scams should not be factored in this category, as they continue to circulate, even tho they in a way were taken(scammed away) from you.
imho there's nothing needed to be done with lost coins, it's sort of a natural thing to happen in crypto currencies, and in time, it will only increase the value of the remaining
coins, which in a way is fixing the problem by itself. Coins get lost, but value of them does not, it gets added to crypto/fiat ratio.

cheers

Yeah, actual dead coins, or "forever frozen coins", happen under very particular scenarios:

1) the owner of the keys dies
2) the owner of the keys loses his memory and therefore access to keys
3) the owner of the keys losses the harddrive/pendrive/paper/whatever in a way that those aren't recoverable by any means

That's about it, the rest of possibilities will make circulation of bitcoin's possible.