The Bitcoin network has hit a major milestone, processing one billion transactions, a significant achievement after 15 years of the network’s existence.
In a report confirmed by Tekedia, the One million transactions were processed in block 842,241 at exactly 9:34 pm on May 5.
This brings the average daily transaction the network processes to 178,475 in the 5,603 days of existence. However, the number of transactions does not include the ones made on the Lightning network, a Bitcoin layer-2 payment protocol enabling faster transactions.
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Data from the Bitcoin-only exchange River found the Lightning Network processed a lower-bound estimate of 6.6 million transactions alone in August 2023, suggesting that hundreds of millions of transactions have been made on Lightning since it launched in January 2018.
Reports revealed that the daily transactions on Bitcoin spiked around the network just concluded fourth halving event which occurred on April 20, 2024, with a record high of 926,000 transactions processed on April 23. Notably, Bitcoin’s daily transaction count has since cooled off to 660,260 on May 4, 2024.
Simultaneously, the Bitcoin transaction fees were 630% greater than the 3.125 block subsidy, reaching a record high of $128 per transaction with Bitcoin’s hash price peaking at $183/PH/day. However, this has taken a nosedive to $4.50. Similarly, the daily transaction count has cooled off with the figure standing at 625998.0 as of May 5.
Interestingly, dormant BTC accounts have begun to come alive after a long period. It was reported that a BTC address that had been dormant for a decade transferred more than $44 million in Bitcoin earlier today. This address had reportedly received the BTC when the price of the crypto asset was trading for $917 on Jan. 12, 2014, according to the on-chain tracking platform Lookonchain.
Also, another wallet that had not transacted since 2016, transferred $6 billion worth of Bitcoin in March this year. Bitcoin is currently trading at $63,675 as at the time of writing this report. The price of the crypto asset is still down 13.6% from its all-time high of $73,740 set on March 13. With the just-concluded halving event that is often followed by a surge in the price of Bitcoin, analysts and investors predict a bullish sentiment.
By reliably facilitating 1 billion transactions in just 15 years, Bitcoin has proven its resilience and capacity at scale. And with accelerating adoption, Bitcoin appears poised to reach the next billion transactions at an even faster pace.
The milestone underscores the significant evolution of Bitcoin from its experimental beginnings. What was initially considered a niche interest for enthusiasts has now transformed into a trillion-dollar asset class that institutions cannot afford to overlook.