Gas fees for Ethereum blockchain transactions have been dropping rapidly since the start of the year and have recently decreased to their lowest levels since August 2021. Despite the reduction, they are, however, not cheap.
According to Coin Metrics data published by CryptoRank Platform, the seven-day moving average cost of an Ethereum transaction was $11.14 on Wednesday, bringing it down to levels seen in the middle of last year before soaring to as high as $55 towards the end of 2021.
There appears to be minimal network congestion at the time of writing. According to Etherscan data, gas fees range from 30 Gwei ($1.53) for a low-speed confirmation to 32 Gwei ($1.64) for a high-speed confirmation.
The average gas price of Ether (ETH) has been drastically declining since the start of the year, plunging all the way from 218 Gwei on January 10 to 40.82 Gwei as of Wednesday, according to Ycharts statistics.
Despite the fact that Ethereum’s non-fungible token (NFT) and decentralized finance (DeFi) sectors are expected to grow rapidly in 2021, the network has been chastised on several occasions for its exorbitant gas fees.
Lower congestion and fees appear to be linked to decreased speculation or interest in NFTs and DeFi at the beginning of this year vs late 2021.
Low trading volume on Ethereum marketplaces
DappRadar data shows that nine of the top ten Ethereum marketplaces have had lower trading volume in the last 30 days, with LooksRare and OpenSea both losing 78.27 percent and 34.75 percent, respectively. Other major losses include 73.29 percent and 80.65 percent for SuperRare and Rarible, respectively.
DeFi based on Ethereum is likewise in trouble. In terms of total value locked (TVL) and native asset token price, eight of the top ten projects have been in the red over the past month.
