James Howells, the guy who accidentally threw away a hard drive containing 8,000 Bitcoins back in 2013, isn’t giving up just yet. His lost Bitcoin is now worth around $923 million!
Giving Up on the Landfill, Embracing Crypto
Recently, Howells shut down rumors that he’d abandoned his quest to recover his digital fortune. He’d spent over a decade trying to convince the Newport City Council to let him search the landfill where the hard drive ended up. He tried everything: formal proposals, legal battles, mediation, even offering tens of millions of dollars. No luck.
So, he’s changing his strategy. Instead of digging through trash, Howells is creating a new cryptocurrency called Ceiniog Coin (INI). This coin will be directly linked to his lost Bitcoin, with 800 billion INI tokens representing his 8,000 BTC.
Ceiniog Coin: The Plan
Ceiniog (named after an old Welsh coin) will be a Layer 2 token built on Bitcoin, using a 1:1 ratio with satoshis (the smallest unit of Bitcoin). Howells plans to launch it in late 2025, using Bitcoin’s OP_RETURN functionality and integrating with Web3 projects like Stacks, Runes, and Ordinals. He’ll have an ICO (Initial Coin Offering) later this year. His hope? The coin’s market value will eventually reach the equivalent of his lost Bitcoin, making him a billionaire.
The Original Loss and the Long Road to Recovery
Howells, an IT professional, accidentally tossed the hard drive containing his Bitcoin in 2013. He only realized his mistake later. Since then, he’s proposed detailed recovery plans, including environmental cleanup and AI-powered landfill scans. He even offered a significant portion of the Bitcoin’s value to fund the excavation himself. But the council consistently refused, citing environmental concerns and doubts about a successful recovery.
Now, Howells is betting on Ceiniog Coin. He plans to offer the coin at a discount initially, hoping its value will climb to reflect the worth of the lost Bitcoin over time. It’s a long shot, but it’s his new plan to reclaim his lost fortune.
