Bitcoin shortage - Is it Possible?

[franky1]

ok. lets view it another way.

stats say people on average save up $24k fiat bank savings .. lets call it 21k for easy math
bitcoin will have
2100000000000000 sharable units

now lets say a 'bit'(100sat) was $1
$21,000,000,000,000.00
thats $21 trillion
or enough for:
1,000,000,000 (1 billion people to put their whole life savings into bitcoin)
or if they are smart investors that dont put al their eggs into one basket
10,000,000,000(10 billion people putting in 10% of their life savings into bitcoin and obviously diversifying the other 90% into other assets)

which. if this was done where $1 =100 sats(a bit). then 1btc=$1m

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[princehandsome]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

every coin has advantages and disadvantages, it is indeed a lack of the Bitcoin because if the request there is no then Bitcoin will die. at the end of 2017 the value of Bitcoin is getting higher because demand more and more and increasing.

[pooya87]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

your question doesn't have anything to do with value of bitcoin or price.

shortage of bitcoin can only happen if there were more people wanting to have some amount of bitcoin but there weren't enough for them. for example this can happen if an extremely large number of coins were lost. the amount has to be huge though, something like 15 millions bitcoin lost! but that is highly unlikely to happen.
so we will continue to have a little less than the cap which is 21000000.00000000 bitcoin and that is enough for the world.

Some say the 21 million bitcoin limit is not set in stone. Like this thread
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5116424.0
But as far as I know from the very beginning it does have a cap of 21 million, but will they all be claimed and circulated is a different story. There have been lost and theft of a portion of those 21 million bitcoins as you have mentioned.
With the law of supply and demand the price can not fall below a certain point from now on going forward.

you are confusing two different discussions. one being about "theft" and another being about "lost".
when some bitcoin is being stolen it is not lost, it just goes into possession of someone else. by "lost" we mean truly lost like when you burn coins (example is sending them to an OP_RETURN output).
that topic you linked is mostly nonsense, 21 million is set in stone mathematically but whether we eventually reach that is another discussion about how much is actually lost. in which case you have to count all the real lost  coins.

[LimLims]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

IMO there will be no shortage of Bitcoins. As all know that there are only a limited amount of Bitcoins created but still, it's impossible to mine them all. Moreover as the price of Bitcoin too volatile and keeps on increasing and decreasing so it will be not possible for someone to mine .
But who knows about future, maybe we can come to an era where there will be no more supply of Bitcoins be there to meet the present demands but still it gonna be a really tough time to reach that time period in near future.

[Mikwik]

For my own opinion, my answer is no. It is not possible for the supply of Bitcoin happen a shortage. Because even the time that it bullrun like it went high going to the moon, it never happens, the demand of the Bitcoin always satisfies and as of now, we can clearly see that it cant be happen where the crypto market goes like this.

[jseverson]

IMO there will be no shortage of Bitcoins. As all know that there are only a limited amount of Bitcoins created but still, it's impossible to mine them all. Moreover as the price of Bitcoin too volatile and keeps on increasing and decreasing so it will be not possible for someone to mine .

Wait what? It is possible lmao. It's actually projected to happen around year 2140. You might want to do more reading on the subject.

For my own opinion, my answer is no. It is not possible for the supply of Bitcoin happen a shortage. Because even the time that it bullrun like it went high going to the moon, it never happens, the demand of the Bitcoin always satisfies and as of now, we can clearly see that it cant be happen where the crypto market goes like this.

I agree that it's incredibly unlikely, but $19k is far from the moon people are expecting lol. I do get your point though, that even at Bitcoin's peak, people never actually felt shortage of any kind.

[rdbase]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

your question doesn't have anything to do with value of bitcoin or price.

shortage of bitcoin can only happen if there were more people wanting to have some amount of bitcoin but there weren't enough for them. for example this can happen if an extremely large number of coins were lost. the amount has to be huge though, something like 15 millions bitcoin lost! but that is highly unlikely to happen.
so we will continue to have a little less than the cap which is 21000000.00000000 bitcoin and that is enough for the world.

Some say the 21 million bitcoin limit is not set in stone. Like this thread
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5116424.0
But as far as I know from the very beginning it does have a cap of 21 million, but will they all be claimed and circulated is a different story. There have been lost and theft of a portion of those 21 million bitcoins as you have mentioned.
With the law of supply and demand the price can not fall below a certain point from now on going forward.

you are confusing two different discussions. one being about "theft" and another being about "lost".
when some bitcoin is being stolen it is not lost, it just goes into possession of someone else. by "lost" we mean truly lost like when you burn coins (example is sending them to an OP_RETURN output).
that topic you linked is mostly nonsense, 21 million is set in stone mathematically but whether we eventually reach that is another discussion about how much is actually lost. in which case you have to count all the real lost  coins.

True but theft can result in those bitcoins being lost as well.
Just look at the quadrigacx debacle that is still going on. They essentially stole the crypto which were held in confidence of their customers in cold wallets. But now those bitcoins and other cryptocurrencies are lost due to the wallets private keys being known only by the ceo of the company but he apparently died.
So the result was at the being a theft of their cryptocurrencies but then it became a loss without recovery in sight of those funds.

[mk4]

*snip*

That's a really bad argument. While it may not apply in the same exact context, saying that bitcoin is not scarce because we have altcoins is like saying that gold is not limited because we have silver. Same with the forks; they're nothing but copies. Sure people can fork and create as much altcoins as they want, but whose actually going to accept and use them? Most altcoins are pretty much like monopoly(the board game) money.

[darklus123]

Shortage will not be referred to its price. Maybe you are talking about the bitcoin cap. And if somebody is holding a very huge amount then you will only be seeing less amount of bitcoin circulating the market. However it could still not cause a shortage of bitcoin from the market as its price will just goes up and the circulation will go down

[Ucy]

 Shortage could theoretically  happen if Bitcoin remains stable,    and the 21 million Bitcoin supply limit is reached with billions of people using Bitcoin.
But I think the stability can be forcefully breached if the demand is on the extreme when whatever is keeping it stable tries to keep it stable.
Developers could make bitcoin supply unlimited to avoid such shortage assuming Bitcoin continues to be stable.

[PuertoLibre]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

I don't think OP is talking about short selling of BITCOIN. The shortage is impossible for bitcoin.  For satisfying the current demand, we need lower prices, so everyone will want their piece from the cake.

[muratsink]

yes, public demand will create value, high or low. BTC's supply every time always decreases, whereas we see today, that public demand for crypto is very large.

it will create a bullish market. but, now I call it the recovery market. so the market moves slowly.  and BTC only has a little shortage. because the market is determined by fast charts.

[Gaff]

Shortage could theoretically  happen if Bitcoin remains stable,    and the 21 million Bitcoin supply limit is reached with billions of people using Bitcoin.
But I think the stability can be forcefully breached if the demand is on the extreme when whatever is keeping it stable tries to keep it stable.
Developers could make bitcoin supply unlimited to avoid such shortage assuming Bitcoin continues to be stable.

This will always be subjected to circulation, and if we think about the shortage it won't happen because every people has their own decision. Holders will not stay longer, they'll come to a certain point that dumping is their final resort when goals is reached. Having good profit is the target if every trader, so that's expected that the price will eventually drop down.

[Slark]

I don't think that's going to happen. Many wonder what will happen when all bitcoins are mined, but the deficit is unlikely to be expected.

[Artemis3]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

do you know there are only 185,000 units of gold in the world.
i know crazy right.
185,000tonnes. thats it. end of

but gold can be split up into kg, grams
but gold can be split up into ounces

bitcoin can be split up into 'bits' and 'satoshi's'

its like pizza. you may order only 1 large pizza. but it is sliced up so that more than one person have have a piece of it

There is the unlikely chance someone will find a new source (there is still some gold extraction going on in my country, at the expense of destroying the rain forest that nature took millennia to grow), i like to think eventually someone will find gold in the asteroid belt... So its not impossible, that the price of gold could go down.

[kamBlanV]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

do you know there are only 185,000 units of gold in the world.
i know crazy right.
185,000tonnes. thats it. end of

but gold can be split up into kg, grams
but gold can be split up into ounces

bitcoin can be split up into 'bits' and 'satoshi's'

its like pizza. you may order only 1 large pizza. but it is sliced up so that more than one person have have a piece of it

There is the unlikely chance someone will find a new source (there is still some gold extraction going on in my country, at the expense of destroying the rain forest that nature took millennia to grow), i like to think eventually someone will find gold in the asteroid belt... So its not impossible, that the price of gold could go down.

I'm not sure we will find new sources, BTC is the end of transaction innovation. gold and BTC will be the first choice and compete for the future. So, I see that BTC shortages cannot be improved by anything.

BTC shortage will be in the spotlight in the crypto world, today, tomorrow and the future.

[senin]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

In the cryptocurrency deficit can not be. If the demand for cryptocurrency rises, its price rises and it is bought at a higher price. It should also be borne in mind that there are thousands of different cryptocurrencies on the cryptocurrency market, and many of them have surpassed bitcoin in their functionality. In my opinion, even from this point of view, there will not be a bitcoin deficit.

[Kakmakr]

There are 100,000,000 Satoshi in one Bitcoin and more than enough for everyone, if the demand outweigh the supply. So most people will not be able to afford 1 whole bitcoin, but they will be able to own a number of Satoshis.   

Bitcoin was developed to mimic Gold and the scarcity and price of the commodity, determine the value of the smaller units of that commodity. <Not a lot of people own Gold bars, but they do own rings and jewellery that was made of Gold.> 

[1BTC EQUALS 1CAR]

If the fees can be remove from the bitcoin transaction then a bitcoin shortage will not a be a problem in the future. 1 satoshi will be like 1 dollar or even a $1k even when some bitcoins get lost in the circulation because some people have lost it or the owner is now dead.

[Congyang]

I personally don’t think it would ever come to that point, since the value of bitcoin adjusts to satisfy the demand. I’d like to hear other opinions?

it will not be possible to experience a lack of bitcoin, because supply and demand affect and prices affect the number of bitcoins on the market. Bitcoin has been set according to the current market.