Average transaction fees on the Bitcoin network have dropped to less than $ 1
The costs of transactions carried out on the BTC blockchain are at levels that we have not observed for over 2 years.
While the price of the top cryptocurrency has dropped from over $ 24,000 to around $ 21,000 in recent days, the transaction fees have also decreased in parallel. Based on data compiled by the BitInfoCharts platform, it appears that yesterday, i.e. August 22, transaction fees amounted to an average of $ 0.82.
Bitcoin transactions the cheapest in over 2 years
High transaction fees with a lot of traffic on a given cryptocurrency's network can give some investors a headache and generate widespread discouragement, especially when they are looking to move from one cryptographic address to another for small amounts. If we take into account Bitcoin itself, at the peak moment, the average cost of the transaction could even exceed $ 62. This took place at the end of April 2021.
Over the last 12 months, the average transaction fees in the BTC network did not exceed $ 5. Currently, the costs have dropped to levels that no one has seen for over two years. The BitInfoCharts platform reports that the amount of fees yesterday was only $ 0.82.
As for the reasons for this, this decline may be related to the bearish in the virtual currencies market and less traffic on the Bitcoin blockchain. In recent months, the rate of this virtual currency has fluctuated in the range of USD 20,000 to USD 25,000, which in both cases is a result far from the time when BTC reached its ATH. Currently, it is traded around $ 21,000 per coin. At the current levels, it is separated from ATH from November 2021 by almost 70%.
Some experts rightly attribute the lower transaction fees in the Bitcoin network to the growing adoption of solutions such as the Lightning Network (LN). It is a Layer 2 (L2) payment protocol created for this cryptocurrency. It was designed to address Bitcoin's scalability issues. LN allows for quick and cheap transactions between nodes, which significantly increases the efficiency of the entire system. They take place outside the main network of this cryptocurrency.
At this point, it is also worth recalling that at the end of 2021, a soft fork called Taproot was implemented in the largest and oldest of the virtual currencies. This update introduces a change to the way BTC scripts work to improve privacy as well as scalability and security.
Another Bitcoin correction
Although the price of the largest cryptocurrency has risen above the level of $ 24,000 per coin in the last 7 days, BTC has not stayed at these levels for too long. Currently, its average price fluctuates around $ 21.2 thousand for one item. Yesterday's session on the chart of this virtual currency was closed with a slight price change, it was only 1.77%.
