Recently, a Bitcoin transaction was confirmed with a mammoth 47000 BTC (~$345 million) transferred for around 0.0000507 BTC transaction fee (around $0.35 or 35 USD cents). So, incredibly, such a significant sum of money was transferred for such a small transaction cost which enforces the idea that Bitcoin transactions are literally the cheapest around the world. The transaction occurred on 23rd of November 2019 and you can view it here.
The total Bitcoin being transferred were 47000.07790285 and the total output was almost the same minus the small transaction fee 47000.07784778. The total worth of this transaction is around 345 million USD which probably indicates a big bitcoin holder aka whale moving around his assets. This joins a rare list of extremely cheap transfers made in the history of Bitcoin according to the latest exchange rate as we have seen transaction costs in thousands of BTCs before but the exchange rate changes a lot and it shapes the perception of the transactions costs as well.
While this kind of transaction is not a regular event in the network and Bitcoin is known to command transaction fees according to the free market sentiment and the available competition between the miners, it is a true testament of the potential of the powerful decentralized network and its flexibility. Conventional money transfer solutions are not flexible and based on subjective transactions costs that change with time. They are already charging huge sums of money for this purpose which can be as high as fixed 10% of the total transaction value which is expensive and extremely greedy on their behalf. But, often it is seen that such banks and payment solutions have monopoly in different areas and thus all transactions are required to be handled by one entity which can fix any price that it likes.
But, times are changing and with the Bitcoin network, it is expected that insane transaction fees and resulting power accumulated by banks and other third party enforcers will be ended with time. Before the last ten years it was impossible to even think that there will be a new system that will offer safe, secure, fast and P2P transactions at literally a fraction of the rate being enforced by banks around the world.
Other famous cheap transactions previously have also achieved similar results. Back in May earlier this year a Bitcoin whale moved around 40000BTC ($211.9 million at that time) for just 0.00074227 BTC ($3.93) in transaction fees. While this amount is still more than ten times higher than the story we are talking about right now, it is paltry and worthless compared to the original sum being transferred.
Another big transfer in recent memory was the one made back in January 2018 when a Bitcoin whale sent over 40000BTC ($435 million at that time) from one wallet to another. This huge transfer only cost the wallet 0.0001 BTC ($1.19) in transaction in fees which is also infinitesimally small compared to the original transaction no matter where the transaction rates go from now on.
While there is no guarantee that Bitcoin will continue to offer low transactions costs in the future because of the block reward halving coming up, it is also true that it will still be less than the burden being posed by the current financial houses of the world today.
Picture source: pixabay.com
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