The Bitcoin network processed its billionth transaction 15 years after mining its genesis block in January 2009.
The network reached this milestone on the same day that a Satoshi-era Bitcoin address came to life.
1 billion transactions
This is evident from Bitcoin data dashboard on Clark Moody, the network processed its billionth transaction in block 842.241 at 05:34 UTC+8 on May 6.
On average, the network has processed 178,475 transactions daily in the fifteen years since its launch.
The milestone drew praise from the crypto community, which had its eyes on the next billion goal.
Tarik Sammour, Associate Professor at the University of Adelaide, pointed out that Bitcoin has achieved this milestone “flawlessly, securely and without any centralized intermediaries.”
Similarly, Matteo Pellegrini, the founder of the Orange Pill App, says noted that Bitcoin reached this milestone in 15 years, compared to Visa’s 25 years.
What drives Bitcoin transaction volume?
In its early years, Bitcoin transactions were driven primarily by users using the currency to move value among themselves. However, that trend has recently changed, thanks to the launch of new protocols such as Ordinals Inscriptions and Runes. These assets have increased attention and interest in the blockchain, driving high network activity.
For context, the Bitcoin blockchain recorded its highest daily transaction volume on April 23, processing more than 926,000 transactions, of which about 90% came from the Runes protocol.
Furthermore, the launch of spot Bitcoin Exchange-Traded Funds (ETFs) in January this year has also increased the number of transactions the network handles.
Satoshi-era BTC address
A long-dormant Bitcoin address, dating back to the early days of Satoshi Nakamoto’s creation, was recently resurrected after a decade of dormancy.
The wallet once contained 687 BTC worth $43.9 million. The content was split and transferred to two different addresses in the early hours of today, May 6. In this transaction, 625.43 BTC made its way to an address starting with bc1qky, while the remaining 61.9 BTC went to bc1qdc.
Blockchain researcher Lookonchain reported that the whale first received the 687.33 BTC on January 12, 2014, when the price was $917.