As reported by CryptoPotato, the Bitcoin network is facing another wave of hot demand in the week leading up to the halving, in part from a now-familiar source: Ordinals traders. Data shows that Bitcoin users are paying more than 90 sats/vByte per block space, bringing the average cost per transaction to $8.5. Ordinals has seen an increase in daily registrations, reaching 162,000 on Thursday, compared to a monthly average of 90,280. Meanwhile, "daily registration fee expenditures" reached $1.24 million, the highest level in the past month. However, the vast majority of network fees are included in Ordinals transactions. Some suspect that on-chain transaction activity is accelerating ahead of Bitcoin's halving, which will halve Bitcoin's supply inflation rate in about a week. The new Bitcoin standard "Runes" protocol invented by Ordinals founder Casey Rodamor will be activated on April 19. Some expect that their transaction activity at launch could push fees to more than $30 per transaction.
