At the beginning of May, the daily transaction volume on the Bitcoin network set an ATH of 685,700 amid a spike in activity related to the Ordinals protocol. On May 6-7, this figure was still above 600,000, which provoked rumors of a DDoS attack on the network.
On-chain metrics record a rapid increase in unconfirmed transactions and transaction fees on the Bitcoin network. For example, the BitInfoCharts service registered an average fee of $19.2 per BTC transaction on May 7. By comparison, the commission was $2.9 on May 1 and $0.9 on April 23.
The rise in transaction fees is directly related to the transaction volume on the Bitcoin network. Thus, according to Coin Metrics, the daily volume of transactions on Bitcoin set a new record of 685,711 on May 1. This was almost 38% higher than the previous ATH, recorded on December 14, 2017, when BTC approached $20,000 for the first time. Moreover, on May 6-7, the daily transaction volume continued to be above 600,000.
The increased volume of transactions provoked an increase in fees on the one hand, and a growth in the number of unprocessed transactions on the other hand. According to Mempool Space, there were approximately 440,000 unprocessed transactions in the Bitcoin mempool as of 12:00 p.m. (GMT+3) on May 8. And as of the time that CP Media had been preparing this news, the fee for a low priority transaction went from about $19 to $22.
The situation resulted in Binance being forced to suspend the withdrawal of the first cryptocurrency from its platform, for example. After a short recovery of BTC withdrawals, Binance suspended them again. Many other providers of Bitcoin-related services faced similar problems.
Rumors of a DDoS attack on the Bitcoin network began to circulate among users. However, a study of other on-chain metrics showed that the current frenzy is caused by the activity of users of the Bitcoin protocol Ordinals. According to Dune Analytics, over 400,000 Ordinals were issued with the help of the protocol during the last 24 hours, which is an all-time high. Moreover, on May 7, ~35% of all fees spent on Bitcoin Ordinals were recorded, which explains the increase in load on the network.
The previous increase in activity associated with Ordinals was observed in early April this year. It was caused by the creation of BRC-20 tokens, which actually enabled the issuance of new cryptocurrencies on the Bitcoin network.
