The Ethereum blockchain has recently hit a record high in the number of transactions processed, if the flurry of activity that followed the Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO) hack is excluded. This, at the same time unique ETH addresses are on the rise.
According to blockchain research firm Diar, the US dollar value of on-chain transaction on the Ethereum blockchain has seen a significant decline, being at $815 million last year, down from $1.1 billion in 2017, the year the crypto ecosystem’s market cap reached its all-time high.
Per Diar, a 97% drop in the on-chain transaction value from a January peak to December’s low was “by and large the cause of an 80% drop in Ethereum’s price.” Similarly, the number of transactions on the Ethereum network dropped 50% at the end of last year, when compared to the start of 2018.
The number of transactions being processed on the Ethereum blockchain stabilized between 16 and 17 million transactions since October, and Diar estimates the figure is “closer to 15Mn transactions for January 2019.”
When it comes to Ether value transaction on-chain, however, the numbers are different. In December of last year, the volume was close to 115 million ETH, a number only surpassed in 2016 after the DAO hack.
Diar notes that fees are unlikely to hinder the network’s growth, as it already has “some of the lowest fees for transaction on-chain.” The developers behind the cryptocurrency are, nevertheless, working on upgrades that will help ETH scale.
As CryptoGlobe covered the next step in Ethereum’s roadmap, Constantinople, has recently been postponed until late February, after a critical vulnerability that could have left smart contracts vulnerable to attacks was discovered.
Ethereum’s on-chain transactions have been rising along with the number of unique addresses in its blockchain. After an all-time high of over 7 million was seen in January of last year and was followed by a subsequent decline, the number of unique addresses started rising in Q3 of 2018.
