It's hard to get a bitcoin out and it's easy to lose. Today Fortune Magazine reports on the latest Chainalysis study that claims that nearly four million bitcoin have been permanently lost, up to a maximum of 23% of total bitcoin. Make the following compilation for you if you wish:
Just as gold bullion is lost at sea, or the $ 100 bill is gone out of thin air and bitcoin disappears forever on the Internet, by 2040 total Bitcoin digging will reach 21 million but it is actually available for trading and usage Bitcoin will be well below this figure.
Chainalysis is a digital forensics company that works on the Bitcoin blockchain, According to their latest research, 3.79 million bitcoins have disappeared, based on the highest valuation, at 2.78 million bitcoins, based on a lower estimate, which corresponds to about 17% to 23% of the existing bitcoin, and now every bitcoin The corresponding value is about 8500 US dollars.
Chainalysis's findings are important because they can only guess the amount of bitcoin lost, as they rely on a detailed empirical analysis of the blockchain that records all bitcoin transactions.
As shown above, Chainalysis's conclusion relies on the classification of the existing Bitcoin supply by age and transactional activity, and for some segments, the company uses statistical sampling to determine the amount of lost bitcoins.
'Mined Coins' partly reflects bitcoin mined in 2017 (presumably not lost) while 'transactional' refers to bitcoin that has been migrated or consumed last year, and very few of them Some disappear, and similarly, the 'Strategic Investors' category, which holds 1-2 years of bitcoin, accounts for a small percentage of bitcoin's loss;
Here's another format, which shows that 'no longer circulating' bitcoins are mostly mined 2-7 years ago and are long-term investors, known as 'hodlers' - and the overwhelming majority The bitcoin lost was held by early bitcoin investors in 2009 and 2010;
These figures also show that the really lost Bitcoin is not hacked or stolen - in which case Bitcoin is of course not lost because the thief holds it.
Note that the figures above are based on the highest estimates, while for the lowest estimates, 'Long Term Investors' bitcoin lost only 30% and the total number of lost bitcoins set to 2,767,468. Moreover, both of these estimates have a key assumption that the coin belonging to Bitcoin inventor Satoshi has disappeared forever.
In the future, more bitcoin will be lost, but they will disappear much more slowly than before, because now they are so valuable that people will follow them more vigilantly (not like a poor guy before with a key Throw away the hard drive, lost 7500 bitcoin.) At the same time, there is a problem, Did Chainalysis's findings mean that bitcoin is more scarce than people think - or does it take the lost bitcoin into account when pricing the current currency?
'This is a very complex issue: on the one hand, the direct calculation of market value does not take into account lost coins, and because of the speculative atmosphere in this market, market capitalization may turn it into a market economy model that affects spending activities.' 'Chainalysis Advanced Economist Kim Grauer said. "However, the market has been adjusted based on the actual availability of demand and supply - to see the exchange behavior will know.In addition, to reduce or increase currency reserves to affect the exchange rate is a well-known monetary policy process. So the answer is yes or no . '
Lost bitcoin and Satoshi's secret
Chainalysis's clients, including the IRS and Europol, have a reputation in the Bitcoin world for their wealth of data and cash research on blockchain wallets, which law enforcement agencies rely on to provide the company with information about the currency Holders and their turnaround details.
Chainalysis's overall methodology is confidential, but a spokesman shared some details about how the company assessed the loss of bitcoin. An important clue is when there is a 'bifurcation' on the blockchain - This year, for example, a Bitcoin clone called Bitcoin Cash was created that could cause bitcoin owners who have been idle for years to trade, providing an opportunity for statistical analysis.
These clues help Chainalysis analyze the 'long-term investor' category of data that people hold before Bitcoin enters the hottest period, the biggest source of uncertainty over whether bitcoin is stored or lost .
As for Chainalysis's 2% 'Transactional' Bitcoin, which the company said is based on a search online for bitcoin bitcoin reports, the company added that due to misdirected transactions or the loss of private keys due to death or negligence Losses are not based on statistical inference and will be further refined in the next few years.
And finally there's a question, what about the Bitcoin bitcoin from satoshi, the anonymous creator of cryptocurrency, which he has not heard since 2011. Chainalysis said about $ 1 million of Satoshi's bitcoin (later this year) The company will provide a more specific figure), while Chainalysis's model assumes that coins that date back to the era of 50-bitcoin can easily be mined with a laptop have disappeared forever.This is a big assumption that if The last proof is incorrect, the circulation of Bitcoin will suddenly increase in number and impact on the market.
Fortune asks Chainalysis what is most surprising about the bitcoin loss outcome.
'First, we gave the results of the survey to a few people who reacted differently to the astonishingness of the numbers, but what I found most surprising and interesting was that when you untied the true meaning of' lost ' Things get more messy, "Grauer said.
