Estimated amount of lost BTC ?

[User365]

I wondered how much bitcoins are already lost (I know there is no posibillity to determine an accurate amount) ?

BTC can for example be lost if someone forgets the password of his wallet/ looses wallet.dat

Is there any estimated amount ?

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[jackg]

I wondered how much bitcoins are already lost (I know there is no posibillyty to determine an accurate amount) ?

BTC can for example be lost if someone forgets the password of his wallet/ looses wallet.dat

Is there any estimated amount ?

There are obviously Satoshi's addresses (and private keys which he claims he won't use).
Beyond that, I'd say it'd probably at least 10000 bitcoins that have been lost due to forgotton passwords (based on the history of this part of the forum).
Also some early miners may have lost/deleted private keys as soon as they ined blocks.
Any coin that hasn't been moved since about 2012 is probably one powered by a private key the user at that time had no access to.

[Golerm]

I wondered how much bitcoins are already lost (I know there is no posibillyty to determine an accurate amount) ?

BTC can for example be lost if someone forgets the password of his wallet/ looses wallet.dat

Is there any estimated amount ?

There are obviously Satoshi's addresses (and private keys which he claims he won't use).
Beyond that, I'd say it'd probably at least 10000 bitcoins that have been lost due to forgotton passwords (based on the history of this part of the forum).
Also some early miners may have lost/deleted private keys as soon as they ined blocks.
Any coin that hasn't been moved since about 2012 is probably one powered by a private key the user at that time had no access to.

Seems like a good estimate.

I remember sending some Bitcoins to friends in 2011 for fun. They laughed as I tried to explain how it works and how it might be worth a lot of money.

Now they're crying because they could have thousands of dollars if they just made backups of their wallets.

[aplistir]

Your estimation is probably quite low.

Here the writer estimates that about 30% of all mined bitcoins are "lost"
https://letstalkbitcoin.com/blog/post/rise-of-the-zombie-bitcoins

And more are lost every day, when some keys are lost, due to accidents or deaths etc.
But it is actually just a good thing for anyone owning Bitcoins. The remaining ones just get that much more valuable.

[jackg]

Your estimation is probably quite low.

Here the writer estimates that about 30% of all mined bitcoins are "lost"
https://letstalkbitcoin.com/blog/post/rise-of-the-zombie-bitcoins

And more are lost every day, when some keys are lost, due to accidents or deaths etc.
But it is actually just a good thing for anyone owning Bitcoins. The remaining ones just get that much more valuable.

That's true. I know there was a treasurer for this forum who was unable to continue and no one has access to his private keys (afaik).

And the estimate is low, I think 30% is a bit high though. But based on the reward halving, that is possible.

[premiumproductss]

19% of the coins existing on market are lost at the moment. Now we are talking about the current supply

[User365]

Cointelegraph answered my question pretty well 

https://cointelegraph.com/news/up-to-four-million-bitcoins-gone-forever

4 million BTC are lost, that equals 19% of the total cap and 24% of the currently mined coins.

[officerpants]

If 4 million are already lost, that means there's only ~100k left to be mined, no?  (16.9m in circulation, 21m cap, 4m lost)  Unless the 'lost' is still considered 'in circulation', then we still have ways to go

[achow101]

If 4 million are already lost, that means there's only ~100k left to be mined, no?  (16.9m in circulation, 21m cap, 4m lost)  Unless the 'lost' is still considered 'in circulation', then we still have ways to go

No. It's 16.9 million mined, not in circulation. Lost is part of that 16.9 million.