Ethereum Transaction Fees Exceed Block Rewards, Network Utilization Stands at 96%
For the first time in Ethereum’s history, miners earned a record 30,500 ETH on Aug 12 as revenue from transaction fees – at 17,000 ETH ($6.87 million), exceeded block rewards — which stood at 13,500 ETH. The spike in transaction fees saw the previous record posted during the crypto mania of 2017 surpassed as Ethereum continues to draw more demand thanks in part to the DeFi.
The snowballing of Ethereum’s DeFi dApps is largely attributed to the rise of transaction fees and Gas costs, forcing miners on several occasions to raise the total gas limit to 12.5 million per block. But other than yield farming and the race to harvest profits by taking advantage of arbitrage on different lending dApps, the spike in the average transaction fees on Ethereum also coincides with renewed activity in Uniswap, the largest decentralized exchange in Ethereum.
