[mayneack]

That works for long as you keep more than you lose. If we get down to 1000000 btc at a reasonable value, what happens when I find my old thumb drive from 2011 that has 100k btc on it? That will be quite a shock to the btc economy.

I don't think this kills bitcoin, but this is part of the "lost coin" problem.

[ph0rque]

What happens if I find an old chest with a 100kg in gold/diamonds/unobtainium? I think this situation is quite a good analogy to your question, the consequences of which are readily known.

[SODaniel]

I think the 'point' here is that as opposed to chests with 100.000.000KG of gold there are actually 'lost' wallet files with enough BTC that it would 'rock' an economy with a currency cap in the future.

I am pretty sure if someone found a stash of gold worth $400.000.000.000 that WOULD actually effect gold prices. Also: Gold has 'real life' uses (production of components etc) and real world costs etc. attached to handling (weight, transport costs etc). None of which BTC has.

[dragonwriter]

> I am pretty sure if someone found a stash of gold worth $400.000.000.000 that WOULD actually effect gold prices.

Yes, it would. Spain essentially demonstrated this in the 16th Century, with the New World as the "stash".

[mayneack]

So I don't know how much gold it would take to rock the price, but I'm guessing it's enough as to be non-trivially "lost" however, any random flashdrive could contain any number of btc.

[thornkin]

The analogy to gold isn't gold that was once possessed that has been lost, it is gold that is newly discovered. A new find of a big gold vein, gold on an asteroid, etc. would be a similar shock to the system.