How many Bitcoins have been mined to date? How much is left?
Recent data reveals that the supply of Bitcoin, the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, is diminishing.
Known for its inherently limited supply, Bitcoin is estimated to have a total production cap of 21 million units through the process of mining.
As of now, 21% of Bitcoin’s total supply has been mined and is in circulation.
There are only 1.49 million Bitcoins left to be mined!
CoinMarketCap data as of mid-November 2023 indicates that over 19.54 million Bitcoins have been mined. With the total supply capped at 21 million, this leaves only about 1.49 million Bitcoins yet to be mined. Kafkas Sönmez, the Global Growth Director at Gate.io, reminds us that Bitcoin was intentionally designed with a limit.
As an asset class, its limited supply is meant to allow its value to be governed by supply and demand, with the expectation that its price will increase over time. New Bitcoins are added to the total supply roughly every 10 minutes, with each block, containing an average of 6.25 Bitcoins, created in this timeframe.
The quantity of Bitcoins per block is halved every four years in an event known as the Bitcoin halving. The next halving in the crypto ecosystem is scheduled for 2024, after which only 3.125 Bitcoins will be produced per block.
0.35 Bitcoins per millionaire
According to estimates, there are about 60 million millionaires worldwide as of 2022. Uğur Güzel, the Global Growth Director at Gate.io, points out that if we were to distribute the current Bitcoin supply equally among these millionaires, each would only receive approximately 0.35 Bitcoin.
Considering that around 6 million of the total Bitcoins produced are permanently lost due to reasons such as forgotten digital wallet passwords, this average further drops to about 0.25 Bitcoin per millionaire. This highlights the rarity and value of Bitcoin.
Given its scarcity, it’s conceivable that one day even owning 0.1 Bitcoin could be seen as a significant asset. While projections suggest that the last Bitcoin will be mined around 2140, there’s also a belief that the total supply might never reach the 21 million cap due to rounding algorithms used across the network.
Bitcoin’s future value will be determined by its usage methods
The future value of Bitcoin will be shaped by various factors, including the portion of its total supply that will be in circulation in the coming years, the accessibility of the supply, the progression of Bitcoin adoption, and its role in financial systems.
When the last Bitcoin is mined, miners will be the first to feel the impact. With the cessation of mining rewards, they will rely solely on transaction fees for revenue. These dynamics will play a crucial role in determining how the end of Bitcoin’s supply will affect investors.
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