Potential flaw with bitcoins in absolutes?

[s1mngg]

So I understand that Bitcoins have a absolute cap of 21,000,000 coins.
Now what do you think of the future of bitcoins if say, someone with a monopoly happens to lose their wallet?
These coins would be removed from the market and everyone would be trading in 0.X values.
Is that a very practical way to go about trading currency?

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[payb.tc]

someone with a monopoly 'losing their wallet' is effectively exactly the same as someone with a monopoly simply 'hoarding'. no practical difference really.

actually losing the wallet would be far better for everyone else as it would take away the threat of a large market dump.

[Slab Squathrust]

Ever heard of the Hunt brothers?  They tried to corner the silver market in the 80's by horading.  There is absolutely no way they could amass such a large portion of the available supply.  As they bought up coins, they would simply raise the price, making it more difficult to buy the next coin. 

Also dealing in fractional coins would not be too bad.  We do it with coins every day.  a penny is .01 dollars.  I suppose if the price got high enough they could simply move the decimal point and adjust the value like a stock split.  For example you have .1 bitcoins and 1 bitcoin = $1000.  A 10 to 1 split would mean you now had 1 bitcoin and it was and still is worth $100.  The total supply of coins would then be 210,000,000 coins.

[Peter-Jan Celis (BitFlow)]

Bitcoins are divisible and set up to be traded in fractions.

A big wallet getting deleted would simply raise the prices for all other bitcoins.

Not exactly something to be afraid of.

[tristian1980]

True, less coins bigger prices in a future.

[TGJJ]

What actually happens when someone loses their wallet, does it mean that the coins will never be replaced?

[finkleshnorts]

True, less coins bigger prices in a future.

You dug up a year old thread for that

[Kazimir]

These coins would be removed from the market and everyone would be trading in 0.X values.

What's the problem?

Is that a very practical way to go about trading currency?

Not any more or less practical than trading in X values, or in X00 values, or in 0.00X values.

Bitcoin is digital and infinitely divisible.

Once 0.0X transactions become mainstream, people will probably tend to use more practical names like bitcents or whatever. As in "Hey bro, here's that 3.5 bitcents I still owed you" (referring to a transaction of 0.035 BTC).

Really, people should stop worrying about that 21million limit. A limit means nothing if the currency is infinitely divisible.

[Kazimir]

What actually happens when someone loses their wallet, does it mean that the coins will never be replaced?

Correct.

Just like gold: if I have a lump of gold and I catapult it into the sun, the gold is lost and it will not be replaced.

[tristian1980]

Still we have some time before the limit will appear. The market situation might change countless times.