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Twelve years aft accidentally throwing distant a hard thrust containing 8,000 Bitcoin (BTC), James Howells is abandoning his long-running effort to excavate it from a Newport landfill. Instead, helium plans to motorboat a caller token inspired by the mislaid coins.
Howells, whose quest included legal battles, drone surveys and a 25-million British lb connection ($33.3 million) to bargain the landfill outright, told Cointelegraph he’s shifting absorption from carnal betterment to a blockchain-backed project.
Rather than trying to excavation up the stash, helium aims to crook the communicative of the mislaid Bitcoin into a DeFi token — symbolically “vaulting” what tin nary longer beryllium accessed.
The mislaid hard thrust that launched a 12-year treasure hunt
In 2013, Howells mistakenly tossed the thrust portion tidying his bureau successful Newport, South Wales. He had mined the 8,000 BTC erstwhile each coin was worthy little than $1. Today, the mislaid stash is worthy astir $905 million, and his communicative has go a cautionary communicative for anyone who self-custodies their crypto.
Source: Bitinfocharts.comOver the years, Howells has projected a scope of solutions, from backing an excavation with backstage superior to proposing to bargain the Newport landfill outright.
In March 2025, the UK Court of Appeal rejected Howells’ bid for a permit to excavate the landfill, with Judge Christopher Nugee ruling determination was “no existent imaginable of success” successful the case.
At Bitcoin 2025 successful Las Vegas, Howells floated an Ordinals-based token representing 21% of the wallet’s worth to money a imaginable dig, with tokenholders earning a chopped if betterment succeeded. That idea, too, was shelved aft the metropolis remained silent.
“They had the accidental to prosecute and negociate with maine connected favorable presumption for 10 years,” Howells told Cointelegraph. “What other bash you privation maine to try? Shall I rise an service and march connected the King himself?”
With the doorway to excavation closed, Howells says he’s giving up connected completing the dig, but not connected the Bitcoin.
Related: Self-custody vs. centralized crypto cards: Freedom oregon convenience?
‘The eventual vault’
With the doorway to excavation closed, Howells is pivoting erstwhile again. Rather than retrieve the 8,000 BTC buried successful a landfill, Howells told Cointelegraph helium plans to motorboat a DeFi-focused layer-2 web built connected Bitcoin.
The token volition not beryllium backed by spendable Bitcoin, but by the idea of the mislaid coins, making the mislaid hard thrust a symbolic vault. “We won’t request to entree the 8,000 Bitcoin wallet due to the fact that the caller token is simply a practice of it — that’s the full point,” helium said. “The landfill becomes a vault nary 1 tin open, but everyone tin see.”
However, not everyone shares this view. Harry Donnelly, laminitis and CEO of Circuit, told Cointelegraph that there's a “very debased chance” of recovering the funds.
"You’d person to multiply the precise debased accidental of recovering the Bitcoin by the debased accidental the token would beryllium recognized arsenic a valid claim, and past by the precocious worth of the Bitcoin. That leaves immoderate residual value, but that’s not what it volition commercialized on. It volition commercialized connected narrative," helium said. "It’s amended viewed arsenic a memecoin than a existent investment."
Still, Howells’ ongoing saga hasn’t been mislaid connected the amusement industry. In April, helium signed a woody with Los Angeles–based accumulation institution Lebul, granting exclusive rights to accommodate his communicative into a docuseries, podcast, and social-first content.
The project, titled “The Buried Bitcoin,” aims to bring 1 of crypto’s astir infamous lost-fortune tales to the surface — adjacent if the hard thrust is mislaid forever.
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