Just bump this question, as it got over-flooded: after the fork (block: #34k) what is the required number of coins to get the maximum reward (50 coins)?
To get the maxinimum reward? you need maybe 50k coins.
But you will stil lget reward with less. for example with 25k coins you might get 30 coins reward
With 10k you might get 15 coins, with anything over ~500 you might get 10 coins.
The meaning of the upper limmit is, if you own alot of coins, like over 50k coins, you will get paid the same amount as finding a block with 50k coins. So it gives you an incentive to find more blocks.
so is it better, in terms of reward, to keep few blocks of, say 25k coins, or split it to 500 coins blocks?