Around 4 Million Bitcoins lost forever!!

[ahmad21]

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/

[2fresh]

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?

[MickeyT2008]

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

[Karpeles]

It is hard to tell, maybe they are from true hardcore hodlers or are just gathering virtual dust in old computers, waiting to be discovered by someone.
Also many bitcoins will never go to market because many early investors have more bitcoins than they could justify to IRS, so they will never spend everything they have. The out of market bitcoins surely are more than 4 millions

And the article is wrong, the last bitcoin will be mined by 2140, not 2040

[aleksej996]

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?

Exactly. They are there, people just wait for Bitcoin to be widely adopted so they can use it at it's intended price and in everyday life.
But some are probably lost, but there is no complication due to that, so we can just ignore it.

[hatshepsut93]

Being out of circulation and lost forever are two very different things - the first means that the coins simply hadn't been moved, while the latter means that they will never be moved and can be removed from total supply. But the fact that some coins haven't been moved for many years doesn't necessary mean that it was lost, and there's no way to tell for sure, unless the owner will somehow confirm it, which is not as easy as it seem, because to prove that you own coins you must own private keys - otherwise anyone can claim that they owned 8,000 Bitcoins but then thrown their hard drive away.
The number 30-50% from the article seems like a random guess not backed by anything. And the certainty that Satoshi lost his coins is also strange - I don't remember him reaching out to the community and saying that his lost his keys - so for now it's just pure speculation.

[UCHCHILD]

So it means we only have 17 million circulating in the market or holding? But anyway I find it advantage because it means it will never be back in zero value because we have some lost of btc and will gonna remain with the value.

[CryptoParadigm]

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

[pixie85]

How can they know how many holder addresses are lost? I mean it's a rough estimation, a very rough. They're saying that it's between 30% and 50% which is huge! They have no certainty that this bracket is even close to being correct. It might as well be 20%, the numbers are completely made up. They're estimating it based on no research just a feeling that a holder would move the coins from time to time if he had the access, which is stupid.

[kueyen]

I think this story is a bit sensational. There is no way to know for sure how many bitcoins are lost forever. You can't automatically assume that bitcoins which haven't moved for a long time have simply been lost and forgotten, rather than belonging to extreme hodlers.

[bitorama]

Many early holders may forget their private keys

[leex1528]

Umm...As others have said just because someone is holding it doesn't mean that they are lost forever.  Lost forever would be you had a paper wallet and the wallet got lost/destroyed or something along those lines.

[gredisgold88]

Not only four million are lost, but micro calculations satoshi on wasted btc wallets have high price-fixing factors.

[Bolt Brownie]

This is just pure speculation, and at least it is admitted in the article that they don't know for sure if these coins are lost or not. Sure, some of those coins that have been inactive are probably lost, but some users might just be holding them because there is no point in spending them right now. These big holders probably can't even cash out their coins because the marketcap is still to low. If they wanted to cash out their entire holdings, they would probably just create major panic in the market and the price would crash.

[CryptoParadigm]

So it means we only have 17 million circulating in the market or holding? But anyway I find it advantage because it means it will never be back in zero value because we have some lost of btc and will gonna remain with the value.

My understanding is 16 million plus but not yet 17 million Bitcoins... The rest will be mined during next several decades i.e. Proof of Work!

[brushtooth]

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?

My immediate thought, they are not lost, they are just simply not in circulation at the moment. Lost would be those coins that can no longer be accessed by anyone. I would expect that to be a much much smaller number, probably around 1% of the 21m coins at most.

[sino22]

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?

Exactly. They are there, people just wait for Bitcoin to be widely adopted so they can use it at it's intended price and in everyday life.
But some are probably lost, but there is no complication due to that, so we can just ignore it.

things like this are very hard to believe. because btc is very advanced and successful. why should be lost to reach 4 million. so here we need a fairly accurate certainty about this article. if not accurate this is called hoax.

[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?

My immediate thought, they are not lost, they are just simply not in circulation at the moment. Lost would be those coins that can no longer be accessed by anyone. I would expect that to be a much much smaller number, probably around 1% of the 21m coins at most.

Actually there are some unknown numbers lost forever. As you could loose all your BTC holdings by forgetting password to your BTC wallet, and those coins are not be recovered... therefore there never are as many BTC out there as they are accounted as mined. One of disadvantages of decentralized aspect of all Cryptocurrencies.

[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?

Exactly. They are there, people just wait for Bitcoin to be widely adopted so they can use it at it's intended price and in everyday life.
But some are probably lost, but there is no complication due to that, so we can just ignore it.

things like this are very hard to believe. because btc is very advanced and successful. why should be lost to reach 4 million. so here we need a fairly accurate certainty about this article. if not accurate this is called hoax.

Not a hoax, its merely side effect of decentralized currency, no actual office to find your account or recover your lost coins!

[CryptoParadigm]

Bitcoin and other Cryptos will teach our society sense of responsibility, since there is no lost and found program. 
I know I am getting more careful with it all.