The number of new runes excavated on Bitcoin daily has fallen below 250 over the past six days, with 157 runes excavated on Monday representing a 99% decline from their peak in late April.
The drop comes after a very successful streak that came a week after launch, which saw an average of 14,700 new runes engraved each day between April 26 and 30, including a record 23,061 runes engraved on April 26, according to the Dune Analytics dashboard. Created by RUNES.be.
Runes is a new token standard that was launched in the fourth Bitcoin halving block on April 20. The protocol allows memcoins and non-fungible token enthusiasts to record and dig their favorite artwork, images, audio, and videos on the Bitcoin network.
It initially provided a much-needed revenue boost to Bitcoin miners looking to mitigate the impact of the recent halving, which saw the block support drop to 3,125 bitcoins (BTC) – worth $196,800 at current prices.
However, the 157 runes engraved on May 13 only contributed $3,835 in transaction fees to Bitcoin miners, far less than the hundreds of thousands of dollars miners were receiving daily in late April.
A total of US$4.5 million has been paid in transaction fees to Bitcoin miners since Runes launched on April 20 – amounting to approximately US$189.00 per day.
Just over 91,200 runes have been engraved on Bitcoin so far.
Runes still make up the bulk of transactions
Despite the decline in the number of runes engraved, rune transactions still made up the majority of transactions in May, which were largely conducted on marketplaces such as Magic Eden, OKX, Ordinals Wallet, and UniSat.
Related: Bitcoin is “the most valuable digital painting ever created” – Artist Ordinals
Launched by Ordinals inventor Casey Rodarmor, Runes aims to use block space more efficiently than its main competitor, BRC-20s, according to Binance research.
Unlike BRC-20s, runes conform to Bitcoin’s Unspent Transaction Output (UTXO) model where UTXOs can hold balances of fungible tokens like runes.
However, Rodarmour stressed in a recent interview that runes are not “the future of finance” – but rather something humans can use to enjoy Bitcoin.
Big questions: How can Bitcoin payments come back?
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