Bitcoin Hits One Billion Transactions Amid Weekend Rebound 15 Years After Satoshi Nakamoto Created It — But Was It Faster Than Ethereum?

May 6, 202411:05 UTC

In a historic milestone for the cryptocurrency industry, Bitcoin surpassed 1 billion on-chain transactions, 15 years after its launch by the pseudonymous creator, Satoshi Nakamoto.

What happened: According to Clark Moody's BItcoin dashboard, the all-time tally hit 1,000,373,355 at the time of publication, at an average rate of 6 transactions per second over the past 30 days.

Bitcoin clocked more than 15 million transactions in the last month, significantly boosted by the halving day Runes frenzy, which sent demand for the blockspace soaring.

The pivotal event was also cheered by Michael Saylor, a well-known Bitcoin proponent and one of the biggest owners of the digital currency.

Bitcoin, however, was slower than Ethereum , which has processed nearly 2.4 billion transactions at the time of writing, as per Etherscan data. Ethereum's foray into smart contracts and decentralized applications contributed to its high usage, while Bitcoin was primarily seen as a store of value project with limited on-chain activity.

However, all this changed over the last 15 months or so, driven by novel token protocols like Ordinals and Runes. New ways to mint non-fungible and fungible tokens on the chain have attracted crypto degens, leading to a surge in transactions.

Why it matters: The historic feat comes in a year that has seen sustained demand for the digital asset, spurred largely by the spot exchange-traded products in the U.S.

Around $11.56 billion in Bitcoin have moved into these investment avenues since their listing in early January, according to SoSo Value. At the time of publication, 4.12% of Bitcoin's total supply was backing these funds.

Spot ETFs launched in Hong Kong last week have also done brisk business, holding about 0.16% of total coins in circulation.

Meanwhile, a well-known crypto analyst pointed out that despite Bitcoin's recent price surge, the cryptocurrency is still in a favorable buying position. "Despite Bitcoin's recent surge from $57,000 to $64,000, the MVRV 90-Day Ratio indicates that $BTC remains in a prime buy zone!" Ali Martinez wrote.

Price action: Bitcoin was trading at $65,166 at the time of writing, following a 2.25% rise in the last 24 hours, according to the data from Benzinga Pro. The coin was amid a sharp corrective phase that saw it dip as low as $59,000 recently.

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