Quote from: DannyHamilton on May 02, 2017, 08:13:59 PM

Each payment you received in the past will require at least 148 bytes to spend in a transaction.

So, for example, if you received 1000 payments of 0.0001 BTC, then you would have a total of 0.1 BTC.

However, if you then want to spend 0.05 BTC, you will need to spend at least 500 of those payments that you received:
500 X 0.0001 BTC = 0.05 BTC.

Since each of them require at least 148 bytes, that means your transaction will be at least:
500 X 148 bytes = 74000 bytes.

The current recommended fee for fast confirmation is 0.00000180 BTC per byte.

Therefore a 74000 byte transaction would require at least:
74000 bytes X 0.00000180 BTC per byte = 0.1332 BTC

That's 0.1332 BTC in transaction fees to spend 0.05 BTC.

On the other hand, if you had received that entire 0.05 BTC in a single payment, you could spend it with just 148 bytes.

In that case, your fee to spend 0.05 BTC would only be:
148 bytes X 0.00000180 BTC per byte = 0.0002664 BTC.

When people say that the money you get from faucets is worthless, they mean it literally.

A payment from a faucet of only 0.0003 BTC is actually only worth about 0.0000336 BTC after you subtract out the fees you'll have to pay.

If a faucet pays you less than 0.0002664 BTC in a single payment, then it will cost you more in fees to spend it than it is actually worth. Meaning, the visit to the faucet actually lost you money.

Very nice explanation.

Most of the bitcoins that i have been receiving i have received from faucets in small amounts. So I guess this could be the reason for this.

I will try to export private keys from the blockchain and see if it makes any difference.

Thanks All for their reply.