Summary
James Howells lost 8,000 Bitcoins worth over £500 million when he accidentally threw away a hard drive containing his private key.
He has been trying to retrieve the hard drive from a Newport landfill for over a decade, but the council has refused to allow him access.
Howells is now suing the council for £495 million in damages.
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He can’t really prove it even exists.
Something to note is the level of environmental damage attempting to recover this could cause. It’s not worth a “chance” for causing that damage.
With headlines like this, it’s always important to keep in mind that bitcoin is such a thinly traded (and largely artificial) market that actually trying to sell 8,000 Btc for real dollars/pounds would instantly and catastrophically crash the price.
I agree with everything you said but 8000 bitcoin won’t move the price much. We’ve seen management firms buying hundreds of millions worth of bitcoins
Different dynamics. Buys require sellers, of which there are a fair amount (though few enough still that large purchases absolutely do shift the price significantly; we’ve seen multiple instances of Tether bringing the price up by 20% or more for the cost of billion newly minted USDT). Sells require buyers, which are in very short supply.
Got it thank you for the explanation
It’s been over 10 years. Even if he found it, what is the likelihood any data could still be retrieved from a hard drive that’s been buried in landfill for that long?
Probably why he is suing for damages now instead of access.
Pretty good actually. But the odds of finding it are basically nil. A needle in a haystack would actually be easier.
He just needs to drag an incredibly powerful magnet through the landfill and sort through the metal that sticks to it. Piece of cake.
Lol I think that would also wipe the HDD
That’s the joke.
“Accidentally threw it away” really sounds more like “threw it away, didn’t have a backup, he now regrets throwing it away”.
Dread to think what his solicitor is making by allowing this delusion to continue (unless he’s representing himself in which case…fair enough I suppose). I’ve been reading about this man for years it seems like.
In Finland we have this saying “voiko vitutukseen kuolla?”
I’ve heard about this guy before but I didn’t realise it was already worth so much at the time he lost it. I do feel sorry for him as it must suck to know you lost that much money from a simple mistake
reverse money printer go rbbbbbbbbbb
Oof
