During a Bitcoin conference this week, Jameson Loop, the former chief engineer of BitGo and the engineer of CasaHodl, said that an estimated 4 million BTC were lost and 2 million BTC were stolen.
By July 2018, a total of 6 million BTCs are inaccessible on the Bitcoin blockchain and have a completely lost status. 28.5% of the estimated fixed bitcoin amount is currently missing, as it is not possible to recover a lost Bitcoin by making a new hard fork in Blockhain.
Because of this, the maximum BTC amount can not be more than 15 million BTC, and currently only 17 million BTC are circulating, only 11 million BTC can be used in real terms, sent, received and traded. The total theoretical amount of 21,000,000 BTC still waiting to be excavated is not to be confused with the current BTC amount.
Current Price Includes Missing Bitcoins?
Chainanalysis, a crypto currency and blockchain analyst firm, first said in an interview with Fortune that 3.79 million BTCs are already suffering losses on the Bitcoin blockchain. This figure was announced in November of 2017.
During that time, Kim Grauer, a senior economist at Chainanalysis, stated that it is not possible to specify precisely that the missing bitcoins are considered by the market, because of the high-speculative nature of the crypto money industry. Grauer stated that in the long run, when the maximum rate of fixed BTC amount was reached, the increase in demand could increase the BTC price further and create a very high value.
"This is a very difficult question. Lost coins are not included in the calculations in direct calculations made on the market from one side. Given the speculative nature of the market, these market volatility calculations can have a major impact on spending efficiency, which affects the economic models of the market. Nevertheless, the market appears to have adapted to the actual demand and supply available - it is enough to look at trading behavior and habits to understand this. Moreover, most people know that the monetary policy process increases or decreases nominal money reserves in order to make an impact on their trading ratios. Because of these reasons, the answer is both yes and no. "
According to the press time, Bitcoin unit price has exceeded 6,700 dollars. The current price of bitcoin is calculated at the rate of 17.13 million BTC, which is assumed to be in circulation on the market. However, if the amount of Bitcoin publicly announced was 11 million, BTC would probably be at $ 10,300.
Similar to the block division, it is also possible that the current market is making a valuation over a lower amount than the current amount of bitcoin, since the fact that millions of bitcoins are lost forever in the blockchain is known to many investors in the global market.
21 Million Bitcoins were Not
Over the past few years, leading investors and analysts of the crypto money industry have consistently stated that Bitcoin price could reach up to a few hundred million dollars from 100,000 dollars, because only 21 million BTC are available worldwide.
The reason that makes Bitcoin a superior means of accumulation than traditional assets like gold is the amount of fixed units it has. Now that only 75% of the BTC amount on the market is reachable, the price of Bitcoin in the long run will definitely increase.