The Runes protocol has experienced a significant decline in activity since its initial week of trading. On May 10, there was a noticeable decrease in activity, with very few new mints and wallets engaging with the protocol.
According to a Dune Analytics dashboard, the protocol’s fee revenue has been steadily declining. While Runes still earns hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees on a daily basis on the Bitcoin blockchain, the total fees have only surpassed $1 million twice in the past 12 days, indicating a downward trend.
Runes, created by Casey Rodarmor, the creator of Ordinals, is a new Bitcoin token standard that allows users to create fungible tokens on the blockchain. Ordinals previously enabled nonfungible tokens on Bitcoin.
The Runes protocol made its debut on April 20, coinciding with the most recent Bitcoin halving event. The launch of Runes sparked a frenzy among investors, leading to a surge in transaction fees and record-breaking profits for Bitcoin miners. In the first week alone, over $135 million in fees were generated.
Data from Dune Analytics reveals that until April 24, the majority of transactions on the Bitcoin network were Runes-related. On April 23, Runes accounted for 81.3% of transactions, pushing Bitcoin’s transaction share down to 18.15%, with Ordinals and BRC-20 transactions each at 0.1%.
However, Runes transactions steadily declined over the next nine days until May 2. From May 3, there was a gradual recovery, with Runes reclaiming a transaction share of over 60% on May 4 and 5.
The mining community welcomed the increase in fees, as their earnings had significantly dropped after the Bitcoin halving. In May, Bitcoin miners’ total revenue fell to under $30 million per day.
Similar to Ordinals, Runes introduced a new token standard on the Bitcoin blockchain. Bitcoin recently reached a milestone of processing its one billionth transaction.
Runes has already achieved notable success, with several Rune collections having market capitalizations in the hundreds of millions of dollars, according to data from Magic Eden.
Furthermore, Rodarmor recently hinted at an innovative audioreactive generative art project during an Ordinals event in Hong Kong, further demonstrating the platform’s potential.
Magazine: Get Bitcoin or die tryin’: Why hip hop stars love crypto