Bitcoin reached block height 840,000 at 08:09:27 this morning, officially completing the fourth block reward halving in history.
Due to the launch of Runes after the halving, the demand for transactions on the Bitcoin chain has surged. Currently, the priority transaction fee on the Bitcoin network has risen to 2,000 satoshis/byte, equivalent to nearly $200 for a single transaction. Leonidas, the developer of Ordinals, stated on the X platform that in the recent five Bitcoin blocks, the transaction fees of individual blocks have exceeded mining rewards. Runes users have offset the reduced rewards after the halving and significantly increased Bitcoin’s security budget.
Historically, Bitcoin halving has always been a precursor to the rise in Bitcoin prices. The last halving occurred in May 2020, and within a year, the price of Bitcoin rose from $9,500 to $65,000. However, this time, Bitcoin has already started a big surge before the halving due to the approval of a spot ETF in the United States, rising from $15,500 at the end of 2022 to $73,680.
