Around 4 Million Bitcoins lost forever!!

[kuyaJ]

Just came across this article today says that 4 million out of the total supply of 21 million have already been lost due to various reasons. The most popular reason are the HODLers who are holding it for quite long. These people have reduced the supply of bitcoins in market which has upsurged the price of bitcoin so much. Satoshi surely is the biggest HODLer himself.

Here is the article : http://fortune.com/2017/11/25/lost-bitcoins/

But holding bitcoin doesn't mean they are lost forever or out of circulation?

the 4 million must be quiet only and only the whale can control the price of the bitcoin.

[jseverson]

That's insane. I didn't think the problem was that bad. I honestly didn't expect the lost coins to even reach a million, besides Satoshi's presumed lost coins. The owners in the early days must be hitting themselves in the head right about now.

Still though, maybe we should take this news with a grain of salt? Chainanalysis' methodology is apparently confidential, so there's no way to gauge how accurate their data is. I guess it doesn't matter at the end of the day though, and the less supply in circulation, the better off we are.

[CryptoParadigm]

Just came across this article today says that 4 million out of the total supply of 21 million have already been lost due to various reasons. The most popular reason are the HODLers who are holding it for quite long. These people have reduced the supply of bitcoins in market which has upsurged the price of bitcoin so much. Satoshi surely is the biggest HODLer himself.

Here is the article : http://fortune.com/2017/11/25/lost-bitcoins/

Sick to known I never holded more than 20 bitcoins in my life and these millions lost wtf..

Definitely, I just read this story from that other guy that signed up to the forum just to ask if he made the biggest mistake of his life when he declined the offer to buy Bitcoins in 2010. He came to ask if these were the same Bitcoins that are now worth so much. Feelsbadman.

How about 10000 BTC for twp Pizzas? The first BTC transaction known, Yummy Pizzas

[RodeoX]

The problem with this is that there is no way to determine how many have been lost. We could count how many claim to have lost coins. We could count coins that have not moved in years. But no matter what data you are looking it it will not result in much of an answer.

[eternalgloom]

I believe some of the coins are missing as junk. However most of them are holding by only a few hardcore holders to wait for the day when BTC hit USD100,000. And what is the value? It is still have to hook up with fiat?

I don't think that very likely actually, if coins haven't moved since 2011 or 2012, it's hard to believe that someone still has control over the wallet in question.
In the early days of Bitcoin, people didn't mind too much if they lost access to a wallet containing hundreds or thousands of Bitcoins.

You wouldn't mind either if you just lost the equivalent of 10 or 20 dollars.

It's just so unlikely that someone would have been able to hold onto all the coins they had if the price suddenly went up 1000% or more.

[bribed]

I believe some of the coins are missing as junk. However most of them are holding by only a few hardcore holders to wait for the day when BTC hit USD100,000. And what is the value? It is still have to hook up with fiat?

I don't think that very likely actually, if coins haven't moved since 2011 or 2012, it's hard to believe that someone still has control over the wallet in question.
In the early days of Bitcoin, people didn't mind too much if they lost access to a wallet containing hundreds or thousands of Bitcoins.

You wouldn't mind either if you just lost the equivalent of 10 or 20 dollars.

It's just so unlikely that someone would have been able to hold onto all the coins they had if the price suddenly went up 1000% or more.

Indeed. Its the same with many altcoins today. Maybe we can see a huge rise in their value too in the coming years, but for now, its not such a big loss if you loose access to an alt wallet with some dollars worth of coins on it. I recently for example lost access to my iota wallet, there were around 30 bucks on it, so I didnt care too much. Still bothers me though, imagine that being worth $3000 in some years.

[ReindeerOnMe]

The problem with this is that there is no way to determine how many have been lost. We could count how many claim to have lost coins. We could count coins that have not moved in years. But no matter what data you are looking it it will not result in much of an answer.

There are a lot of bitcoin holders and we will not really determine whether if they are just holding it for a several years or maybe they lost it but I am thinking where is the bitcoins of some criminals that is handed to police? Can we consider it part of the bitcoin that is lost forever or other people are using it now?

[rajuahmed763]

So doing the math we actually have somewhat about 11-12 million BTC which are being HODL!

It may be that its hold / stock has to be kept. And the amount of day's increase will increase. So it has to be seen for more days.

[1NV3ST0NM3]

Just came across this article today says that 4 million out of the total supply of 21 million have already been lost due to various reasons. The most popular reason are the HODLers who are holding it for quite long. These people have reduced the supply of bitcoins in market which has upsurged the price of bitcoin so much. Satoshi surely is the biggest HODLer himself.

Here is the article : http://fortune.com/2017/11/25/lost-bitcoins/

But holding bitcoin doesn't mean they are lost forever or out of circulation?

Yes, but I think they are taking an assumption that out of all such coins which have been held for long term around 20-30% are lost because some people have not been able to recover their private keys or maybe would have lost it. One could really see many such stories on the forum itself. But I still feel 20-30% is too much even for an assumption too.

[ahmad21]

Wow, but the current supply is in there, maybe those miners or whatever they are still have their bitcoins on their wallet, so it is not making any difference because their balance is still going up day by day.

The max supply would be at 21million forever, and it would not change. When someone die, the balance will be in there forever, there is no way to change that, and it does not affect the market.

Maybe there are less bitcoins moving around, but they are still holding them in there, but nobody knows what really happened to those wallets, maybe they are locked

Yes you are right even I tried to made such a assumption that let's assume a certain percent of satoshis are going to miners for every certain transaction. They are HODLing such satoshis for a long term to gain huge profits. So at last aren't these satoshis just flowing out of the total market supply? If this continues like for next many years the supply is actually decreasing because what determines price is the circulating supply not the actual total supply.

[CryptoParadigm]

Just came across this article today says that 4 million out of the total supply of 21 million have already been lost due to various reasons. The most popular reason are the HODLers who are holding it for quite long. These people have reduced the supply of bitcoins in market which has upsurged the price of bitcoin so much. Satoshi surely is the biggest HODLer himself.

Here is the article : http://fortune.com/2017/11/25/lost-bitcoins/

But holding bitcoin doesn't mean they are lost forever or out of circulation?

Yes, but I think they are taking an assumption that out of all such coins which have been held for long term around 20-30% are lost because some people have not been able to recover their private keys or maybe would have lost it. One could really see many such stories on the forum itself. But I still feel 20-30% is too much even for an assumption too.

Decentralized meaning we will never know to a single Satoshi

[Adinalini]

OMG! Thanks for sharing the article. There should some way to delete bitcoin from accounts that are not being used and be put again in circulation.

[fanbeila]

Just came across this article today says that 4 million out of the total supply of 21 million have already been lost due to various reasons. The most popular reason are the HODLers who are holding it for quite long. These people have reduced the supply of bitcoins in market which has upsurged the price of bitcoin so much. Satoshi surely is the biggest HODLer himself.

Here is the article : http://fortune.com/2017/11/25/lost-bitcoins/

But holding bitcoin doesn't mean they are lost forever or out of circulation?

Absolutely,bitcoins which were being held could not be termed as lost coins.Long time holders could suddenly change their decision and may sell their bitcoins which would bring back the bitcoins in to circulation.The only thing that we would have to worry is about the one million coins which satoshi has since we actually don't know whether satoshi is still alive or not.If those coins comes in to circulation suddenly,that would make a big difference.

[Sweeet]

What if someone had enough bitcoin to send a large amount of bitcoin with a low enough miners fee that would take years to confirm naturally making the value of bitcoin higher for a higher demand then selling. The ultimate pump and dump.

[Jmesser80]

Tough to say how many are actually "Lost", but maybe someday I will find some in my wallet that someone generously left me.

[barabut]

At the end of the day they will be in the circulation, I belive that they wont be become lost it should be holding by someone

[darthmaul]

They are not really lost they are just locked away in the wallets for which they had the private keys. I believe that it will not impact the bitcoin market in negative terms because the math is straight here, as we are short on 4 million bitcoin it is clear that we will have increased demand of the bitcoin and we won’t be fulfilling the place of those 4 million in short terms and thus it will force the market to put more value on the bitcoin and thus it will get more and more expensive. The end result? Well, the big investors will have million of worth bitcoin in to their wallet and they will rich already. People who held bitcoin since very long will be in the category of billionaire club now and the middle investors like you and me can now move forward to invest into bigger projects, different ideas or may be businesses in real world because we will be having great profits due to the aftermath.  So thank to those 4 million bitcoin and once agin they will be over the blockchain forever. They are not lost.

[davidjoshua]

About 4 million bitcoins are lost forever, which is a pretty big number when I hear this information
It is very true that those who do not lose sight of the value and interest in bitcoin

[btcprospecter]

Really they are only lost until they move I'm sure at some point in the future someone will find a way to access these coins but for now they are lost

[jennywhzz]

Just came across this article today says that 4 million out of the total supply of 21 million have already been lost due to various reasons. The most popular reason are the HODLers who are holding it for quite long. These people have reduced the supply of bitcoins in market which has upsurged the price of bitcoin so much. Satoshi surely is the biggest HODLer himself.

Here is the article : http://fortune.com/2017/11/25/lost-bitcoins/

If bitcoins are hold by few people and they dont use them and keep them in their wallet, then it does not mean they are lost. They are just stored in the wallet and they can be used by the holder any time. This is just like we hold money on the bank and keep it in the bank for years until we need it.
So  4 million bitcoins are not lost.