During the frenzy of minting an Ordinals-inspired token called POLS, gas fees on the Polygon network reached as high as $0.10.

Gas fees on Ethereum layer 2 Polygon (MATIC) surged more than 1,000% to a peak of $0.10 as users minted a token inspired by the Ordinals, called POLS.

In a Nov. 16 (ex-Twitter) post, Polygon founder Sandeep Nailwal shared his surprise at the increase in trading activity on the network, saying the surge in volume could be due to the launch of a new line of Polygon-based non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

The increase in network activity and the sudden spike in gas fees appear to be primarily due to the frenzy of enthusiasm for minting new POLS tokens.

Dune Analytics data shows that the surge in POLS minting activity coincides with more than 102 million MATIC tokens (worth $86 million at current prices) being used as gas fees.

POLS resulted in over $86 million of MATIC being used as gas fees.

The POLS token is built on a protocol called PRC-20, which operates in a similar manner to the BRC-20 token standard that Bitcoin Ordinals derived from.

According to EVM, an Ethereum Virtual Machine data provider, only 8.7% of the POLS supply has been minted, with just over 18,100 owners claiming the token.

As of the time of this post, Polygon’s on-chain gas fees have returned to typical levels, stabilizing at around 882 gwei. Gas fees quantify the amount of computation required to conduct a transaction on a given blockchain, with 1 gwei being roughly equivalent to 0.000000001 MATIC.

Since then, Polygon on-chain gas fees have returned to slightly above average.

Source: Livdir

In May of this year, the Bitcoin network saw a similar spike in activity, albeit longer-lasting, following the release of the Ordinals protocol, which allows users to mint NFTs directly on the Bitcoin blockchain.

The subsequent frenzy over Ordinals NFTs and BRC-20 tokens caused Bitcoin fees to reach their highest level since April 2021, a development that led traditional Bitcoin holders such as Samson Mow and Adam Back to argue that NFT protocols and token standards are a waste. #Polygon   #Gas