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After years of anticipation, Bitcoin (BTC) has halved its miner rewards in the recent Bitcoin Halving event, but as BTC prices remain within a tight trading range – capped below $68,000 despite an increase in fees – what’s in store for the top coin?
The much-anticipated Bitcoin halving event, expected to trigger a surge in price and network activity, has failed to deliver the knockout punch predicted by many analysts.
Looking at the BTCUSDT daily chart, price action is nothing but drab.
(BTCUSDT)
As of April 23, BTC is changing hands at around $66,200 and relatively stable in the previous week of trading.
While Bitcoin briefly saw record transaction fees and miner payouts on Halving Day, the excitement has since fizzled out quickly, leaving prices below April 13 highs of $68,000
Bitcoin Runes Protocol Launch, Transaction Fees Spike
On April 20, there was an unusual spike in transaction fees, reaching a staggering average of $128, a nearly 7X jump from April 19. On April 20 alone, Bitcoin generated $78.3 million in fees.
However, fees dropped sharply on April 21, plummeting to $34, which, by all standards, is more than last week’s average.
According to YCharts data, the average transaction fees hovered between $16 and $20 before halving.
(yCharts)
That Bitcoin transaction fees are higher on April 21 than on April 18 and 19 could be due to the launch of the Runes protocol on the Halving block.
The launch of Runes, a new template allowing developers to launch fungible tokens relying on Bitcoin for security, fueled a frenzy among meme coin and NFT enthusiasts who wanted to inscribe files on the Halving block.
According to Mempool.Space data, one user paid over $8,500 to inscribe a transaction on block height 840,000 on April 20.
Data shows that ViaBTC, the mining pool that confirmed all the Halving block transactions, received a record $2.4 million, mostly from transaction fees.
Bitcoin Miners See Record Pay: Why Are BTC Prices Flat?
While transaction fees soared, subsequentially pushing miner revenue to an all-time high of $107 million, the overall block reward for miners when the Runes protocol launched was slashed from 6.25 BTC to 3.125 BTC—a revenue-dashing adjustment for miners.
With this protocol-driven measure, miners must now make serious adjustments to become more cost-efficient and gain an advantage over competitors.
Already, it is expected that some small miners will have to close the shop, affecting the hash rate.
Thus far, hash rate, which gauges computing power channeled to the network, is up roughly 8% to 601 EH/s. Over time, hash rate will likely fall.
(yChart)
Though more adoption of Bitcoin as a medium of exchange or store of value will help drive up transaction fees, prices remain a crucial variable.
Most analysts expected prices to spike on Halving, even reversing losses of April 13. However, the coin remains muted at press time, currently sitting around $66,100.
The lack of volatility on this historic day suggests that the event could have been priced in.
Even so, analysts expect prices to rise in the months ahead. Historically, Bitcoin bulls tend to push prices over recent all-time highs to new levels.
Explore: How to Get Ready for Macro Summer 2024 – Will Bitcoin Go Up After Halving?
Disclaimer: Crypto is a high-risk asset class. This article is provided for informational purposes and does not constitute investment advice. You could lose all of your capital.
