High Bitcoin Transaction Fees Return as Blockchain Faces Congestion Again
Bitcoin users are currently facing difficulties with high transaction fees as the blockchain becomes congested once more, although the cause may be different from what some might expect.
Data from mempool.space, a platform that provides information on Bitcoin transactions, reveals that a medium-priority Bitcoin transaction now costs $34.08 to be processed promptly.
Over 333,400 unconfirmed transactions are waiting in line for confirmation.
As has been the case in previous instances of high Bitcoin fees, many members of the cryptocurrency community on Twitter expressed frustration with Bitcoin’s limited transaction capacity and advocated for the adoption of more efficient layer 2 solutions and sidechains.
On the other hand, Bitcoin miners are enjoying increased revenue due to the surge in fees, earning over double the amount of Bitcoin per block.
Bitcoin hashprice is screaming toward $0.08/th as fees pump. A nice windfall for miners to end the week. pic.twitter.com/LJ5UQiMRNA
— Marty Bent (@MartyBent) June 7, 2024
Surprisingly, the cause of the congestion is not related to the Ordinals or Runes protocols, which have previously driven fees to exorbitant levels.
CryptoQuant, a cryptocurrency analytics platform, identified OKX, a prominent crypto exchange based in Seychelles and currently the third-largest in the world by trading volume, as the main culprit behind Bitcoin’s congestion.
Julio Moreno, the Head of Research at CryptoQuant, explained on Twitter that OKX’s internal transactions to consolidate outputs have led to the spike in fees.
When users want to send Bitcoin from their wallets to another wallet, they have to pay transaction fees on each unspent transaction output (UTXO) in their wallet.
This can result in significant
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