Can bitcoin quantity go down?

[Hugroll]

if you are talking about your bitcoin balance on the exchange, no it should not go down. but if you are talking about the overall amount of bitcoins that exist and are accessible. that can go down because people lose access to their coins quite often.

[Barbut]

Probably you saw your balance in dollars, that is changing with price. But if you think your balance was in bitcoins, then maybe exchange site took something for them. I don`t think something else can happen.
Your question is a bit strange, if you think about quantity of all bitcoins, then i think people lose coins from time to time, or they stay in some wallets where they stay forgotten.
Here I see that most of us think that you have seen your balance in dollars, that is most logical explanation. Try to check situation a bit more and tell us what it was.

[groll]

Yes, it should be the value or the price of the bitcoin should go down not the quantity of bitcoin itself.  If you have 1 bitcoin it would be 1bitcoin forever.  Only its price would fluctuate.  As to the exchanger you are saying, I have no idea on what you are saying, maybe you should state the name of it.

[serjent05]

Yes, it should be the value or the price of the bitcoin should go down not the quantity of bitcoin itself.  If you have 1 bitcoin it would be 1bitcoin forever.  Only its price would fluctuate.  As to the exchanger you are saying, I have no idea on what you are saying, maybe you should state the name of it.

No matter what happen bitcoin amount in the blockchain will never decrease in quantity.  It may be not spendable but it still reflect in the blockchain.  Those who lost their bitcoin wallet together with the passphrase and private keys with it and don't have backup will not be able to move their bitcoin and lost it but the amount is still counted in the total amount that can be seen in the blockchain.

[wikenpp]

Yes, it should be the value or the price of the bitcoin should go down not the quantity of bitcoin itself.  If you have 1 bitcoin it would be 1bitcoin forever.  Only its price would fluctuate.  As to the exchanger you are saying, I have no idea on what you are saying, maybe you should state the name of it.

The price of bitcoin is not a factor that determines supply. Supply is fixed. However, if people decided to sent their bitcoin to a burn address or for that matter lose access over thei rwallet, you can say the supply is down. Nobody knows the amount of bitcoins that are gone that way, and even a untouched address for 7 years, doesn't say antyhing.

[socks435]

Yes, it should be the value or the price of the bitcoin should go down not the quantity of bitcoin itself.  If you have 1 bitcoin it would be 1bitcoin forever.  Only its price would fluctuate.  As to the exchanger you are saying, I have no idea on what you are saying, maybe you should state the name of it.

The price of bitcoin is not a factor that determines supply. Supply is fixed. However, if people decided to sent their bitcoin to a burn address or for that matter lose access over thei rwallet, you can say the supply is down. Nobody knows the amount of bitcoins that are gone that way, and even a untouched address for 7 years, doesn't say antyhing.

I think many people are forgot their wallet which is holding a lot of bitcoin and some investors in bitcoin are dead. so it can help that bitcoin will stay in the good price until new adopters and investors are come that can increase more the value of bitcoin..
Every block halving can be happen to decrease or down the quantity of our supply its not fix every block halving its happening..

[calkob]

bitcoin will go down over time as people forget the priv keys and lose access to their coins, what a sad day.... lol   there is also people sending coin s to address that can never be recovered.   

[ivanst776]

I have some bitcoins in an exchange and I found today that, without any transactions being made, the quantity has gone down.

I have contacted the exchange who have said:

the balance varies according to the prices that are floating

Is this correct? In my view the quantity of bitcoins I have should not fluctuate, only the value of said coins. Or am I missing something?

Any explanations would be great!

The total bitcoin quantity does not change (the 21M) but the useful bitcoin quantity can change but not drop.

People lose their private key or their wallet data or people "burn" them but this does not make the bitcoin quantity going down.

What the exchange has told you I'm know sure what they meant by that but that does not make sense.

[rapazev]

if i understood it right, you dont have bitcoins in this exchange. what you have is an altcoin and in your wallet they show the bitcoin equivalent.
for example, i use poloniex and if i have 1 ETH today, in my wallet they will show something like "Estimated value of holdings: $12.15 USD / 0.01835000 BTC".

See, i have 1 ETH and that shouldnt change, but the estimate bitcoin and dollar will.

[Cryptogott]

He is probably talking about margin lending on poloniex. If any sharp movements happen on the market, you can lose bitcoins...

[KingdomHearts]

no bitcoin quantity will be never go down because bitcoin are going to more stronger and bitcoin adoption are going to more increasing day by day and i hope that bitcoin will get more stronger in the future .

[dihari]

I am angered what happened with bitcoin lose. We can imagine, people with huge amount of bitcoin save bitcoin on usb, and they broke or lose it. Is bitcoin quantity is go down?

[tabas]

Bitcoin's quantity is destined to be limited to 21 million and that is not going to go down. Unless there are a lot of bitcoins who are stored in the hard wallets and have been misplaced for some place that you can't even remember and that is going to make the quantity of bitcoins down in the economy, but for the total, it won't.

[genos]

Bitcoin's quantity is destined to be limited to 21 million and that is not going to go down. Unless there are a lot of bitcoins who are stored in the hard wallets and have been misplaced for some place that you can't even remember and that is going to make the quantity of bitcoins down in the economy, but for the total, it won't.

You are right. Bitcoin is limited to 21 million. But in other case if someone safe their money in wallet and then he /she forget the password the amount of bitcoin that can be used is decrease. But bitcoin can divide into 8 decimals so each number of bitcoin is very very worthed in the future. It is better than if there is inflation in bitcoin.

[Harlot]

With my experience from exchanges I got to realize fees I don't know. A lot of them are hidden fees or fees I have not read across in their charges. That is how they make their money from fees they charged you everytime you use their services, of course it is needed for the site to be fully operational daily. My advise for you bro if that continues to happen withdraw your bitcoin from the exchange and read the chrage and fees section for your to understand.

[Mr.grin]

of course bitcoin quality may decline at any time. if the price fell below bitcoin hundreds of dollars, most likely, the interest that people have to have a bitcoin will decrease, thus making many people trade bitcoin they have become dollars. it would make the quality of bitcoin be dropped, and the possibility of a lot of people back looking altcoin higher than bitcoin

[virusasog]

Bitcoin's quantity is destined to be limited to 21 million and that is not going to go down. Unless there are a lot of bitcoins who are stored in the hard wallets and have been misplaced for some place that you can't even remember and that is going to make the quantity of bitcoins down in the economy, but for the total, it won't.

I am not aware of limit of the bitcoins. But I am sure usage of bitcoins will not be same in the future and as mining get reduce every halving. Bitcoin may a stuck in here and there.

[ObscureBean]

There are two tables, one shows the live bitcoin price in various currencies. For example:

Dollars     US$601.01
Euros       E   541.06
...

The second table, is 'My Balance'. For example:

Bitcoin     0.5
Dollars    300.50

And since the start of the thread, the quantity of bitcoins has gone up by 0.00000224.

It seems to me like the balance on that exchange is kept in USD, and not in Bitcoin. Therefore, your balance tends to increase or decrease based on the price in USD. I can't be completely sure though. Something isn't right with that exchange.

Okay. Well thanks to all for your help and explanations. Things are a little clearer now Any suggestions of an exchange that I can use as an alternative?

I take it you're looking for an exchange where you can trade altcoins like on Bleutrade? Personally, I've always liked Bittrex, I've tried a number of exchanges but always end up going back to Bittrex. I've never had any problems there, support is good and deposits/withdrawals are processed reasonably fast. Poloniex is also very good.

[naidray]

if you are talking about your bitcoin balance on the exchange, no it should not go down. but if you are talking about the overall amount of bitcoins that exist and are accessible. that can go down because people lose access to their coins quite often.

Oh! do yo mean that if someone loose access to his key the bitcoin amount associate with address is gone forever and will reduce the quantity of bitcoin ?
I have never thought of that, I was thinking that the person will just lose the coin but the quantity of bitcoin will not reduce. Maybe controllable amount of bitcoin may decrease but all 21 million bitcoin will stay within bitcoin addresses only.

[Doamader]

Op has already someone said if the funds were without being invested into anything, margin or lending or even trading, never could happen change the ammount of bitcoin or altcoin you do have, just their value changes daily, if the exchange you present is taking your coins just leave it before it turns into scam.