It is not necessarily a prediction. It is just the theorized (or predicted) time that the final bitcoin will be found. (Just checked again, the projection is in the early 2100 range. Sorry.) That is when the shit will hit the fan, so-to-speak. You will then have a currency with a fixed amount of units available (21,000,000 units) with no value-basis.
So let us replace bitcoins with acorns, for example.
If there are only 21,000,000 acorns in the world, and there are no more trees left to make new acorns, and there are no more acorns to be found because all the squirrels ate the buried acorns, then what possible value can the acorn have? Nobody is going to care about the acorn because it has no value-basis. There is not more to be found, and there is no more to be made. It thus becomes worthless. There can be no speculation on the acorn because no more can be had. The only thing one can do to increase the value of the acorn is to start destroying other folks' acorns, to increase the value of their own acorns. Eventually you get to the point where there are no more acorns to destroy. So now the acorn is in a holding pattern. There are only a few people who have acorns. But why would anyone else want the acorn, since it represents no value compared to what currency the rest of the world has been basing worth upon?
Sorry, I am not making sense. Tired. Bedtime.
