[2017-11-25] Nearly 4 Million Bitcoins Lost Forever

[B!t_Kong]

New Study Says.

Just as gold bars are lost at sea or $100 bills can burn, bitcoins can disappear from the Internet forever. When all 21 million bitcoins are mined by the year 2040, the actual amount available to trade or spend will be significantly lower.

Source: http://fortune.com/2017/11/25/lost-bitcoins/

[Catmony]

Yes this is true but there is no way to figure out all bitcoins that are not in control of their owners right now;

1. If satoshi is already dead, almost every coin he owns is lost
2. Many early miners who just left their bitcoin in wallets without backing it up is lost.
3. The one who bought bitcoin on early days and forgot his password which have encrypted his wallet, bitcoin gone.

There are many ways people can loss access to their wallet/bitcoin total lost amount can be more than that 4 million.

[sanbashiyi]

That is ok. A lot of Bitcoins will keep getting lost if someone who holds them forgets his/her private keys, passes away, loses his phone or gets scammed by hacker. Over the time we would find more such news pouring in so it is ok. Get used to it.

[rohqit]

is this the reason for the price mooning like this ?

[Iranus]

This is only a very broad estimate and the range is between 2.78 million and 3.79 million.

While Chainalysis seems to be the most well-known and trusted blockchain analysis company in BTC at the moment, its statements should certainly not be treated as fact.  We don't know exactly how much BTC is lost or how much could be lost in the future.

What we do know though is that as the BTC price increases, the chance of people losing coins becomes significantly lower because they're willing to spend more to secure their valuable holdings.

There's also the fact that over time, better and better security systems are being developed and there is more awareness about the most secure ways to hold coins.