There’s no stopping him, it’s a huge amount of money, so if there’s even a small chance he can recover it, of course he’ll try. As for whether he has the seed phrase or some kind of access info, I’m pretty sure he does. Otherwise, why would he still put in all this effort if he was already hopeless? Simple logic, really.
And now there’s this new development involving him. Not sure if it’s something that’ll attract people as an investment, but it seems like something new is brewing.
https://www.panewslab.com/en/articles/0b215440-3751-48b2-98c6-3954514ccdb0PANews reported on August 5th that British IT professional James Howells stated on the X platform: "For twelve years, I have tried every possible means to communicate with Newport City Council, including public proposals, profit-sharing proposals, mediation, legal action, and even a formal offer of over £25 million in return. These Bitcoins are worth $1 billion, but they have ignored all of these proposals. They want me to give up, but I am no longer seeking permission.
Therefore, I will tokenize the entire 8,000 Bitcoins in my wallet and convert them into 800 billion Ceiniog Coins (INI), with each INI equivalent to one Bitcoin satoshi. This project is based on the Bitcoin network, uses OP_RETURN technology, supports Stacks, Runes, and Ordinals protocols, and is expected to go online by the end of 2025."