Hypothetical: Suppose you owned a car, and this was stolen. If the car were sold intact, then presumably you could reclaim the car from the buyer because of the

Hypothetical: Suppose you owned a car, and this was stolen. If the car were sold intact, then presumably you could reclaim the car from the buyer because of the nemo dat rule. But now suppose the thief sold the car to a salvage yard. The salvage yard breaks the car down into scrap metal, which is melted down and recycled for use in other products. I'm not very familiar with this area of law, but presumably you would no longer have a claim to the car or the scrap because the original piece of property to which you had title, the car, was destroyed. You might have a claim against the scrap yard for not checking title on the car and could recover the fair market value of the vehicle. Same with bitcoin -- once someone comingles the stolen coins with other coins, the original balance of coins has been destroyed. There is no action against parties further down the blockchain. Your only remedy should be to recover the fair market value of the coins from the party that "destroyed" the coins. <standard "this is not legal advice" disclaimer goes here>