What happens if coins are sent to an invalid address?

[LordGreynick]

Hi all,

Someone has sent me an invalid address. Do the coins come back automagically?

[bitcon]

i think they are gone forever. but it helps deflation of BTC.

[LordGreynick]

Are you serious??

[cbeast]

The QT client won't allow sending to an invalid address. Others probably won't either. Perhaps they concatenated the address when it was copy/pasted.

[bitcon]

i'll have to try it now that my coins are worthless......

[LordGreynick]

thanks so much for the replies .. it turns out the client hadn't confirmed the transactions for over 24 hours - restarted the client and it confirmed

[Herodes]

Hi all,

Someone has sent me an invalid address. Do the coins come back automagically?

coins can't be sent to an invalid address from a client I think - you'll get a message the address in invalid.

If you get a wrong, but working address, then it's an other story..

[rayvellest]

Invalid address, per definition, are invalid, so the transaction would not complete. Now, if you mistakenly send them to a valid address, then yes, they are lost and you'll make someone very happy indeed.

[odolvlobo]

Post the transaction. Maybe someone will recognize or can otherwise determine who owns the address.