Long criticized over its high network costs, the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain has recently recorded a drop in transaction gas fees to a six-month low – the lowest level since August 2021.
In a tweet on March 9, the cryptocurrency data aggregation and analytics platform CryptoRank confirmed this information providing a full chart showing the evolution of Ethereum gas fees since October 2020 to substantiate the data.
These statistics were supported by the crypto market analytics firm CoinMetrics in a tweet published on March 9, along with a chart of the gas fees’ movements over time.
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As per Etherscan.io data, the average cost of transacting on Ethereum at press time was 40 gwei or $2.24.
Ethereum transaction fees correlation with NFTs
In its tweet, CryptoRank also notes that gas fees have surged after staying in this range for about three months, citing experts that attribute it to a rise in interest in non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and decentralized finance (DeFi).
Notably, Finbold earlier reported that the interest in NFTs had recorded a significant increase between December 2021 and the beginning of February 2022, reflected in the notable boost of both traffic and Google search interest.
However, the interest in NFTs has been in a steady drop ever since, falling by 72% in daily trading volume on OpenSea, the world’s largest marketplace for digital collectables, from a high of close to $250 million.
Furthermore, the downward trend in gas fees corresponds with the falling price of ETH, which has been steadily decreasing since the beginning of 2022.
At press time, the price of Ethereum stood at $2,735 and has struggled to reach and remain over the $3,000 mark over the week before, as data from CoinMarketCap shows.
Specifically, the price of ETH has decreased by 8% over the 7-day period, from $2,954 a week earlier.
