Bitcoin
Top Crypto Companies Earning the Most Fees
Key Takeaways
- Crypto transaction fees are generated when you buy, sell, or move crypto from one address to another.
- These transaction fees can be a barometer for the growth and vitality of a crypto project, as there tends to be a correlation between transaction fees and the success of a project.
- Since rising fees can signal big investments in crypto, here is our list of the top crypto companies earning the most fees.
Crypto networks charge fees when you buy, sell, or move crypto. These fees help prevent spam, support blockchain security, and assist with platform development: essentially, Fees are how crypto companies make money.
Fees vary by network (sometimes even per transaction) and are generally calculated based on urgency, data size, and complexity. For example, a complex transaction on Ethereum (such as a payment to many wallets) costs more than a simple transaction (a single wallet).
For crypto investors, fees are a great barometer of a company’s success. Because they are like a traditional company’s revenue, they are one of our most important metrics for identifying promising crypto investments. (The other metrics are daily active users, price and market cap: read more here.)
In this guide, we bring together the Top Crypto Companies Earning the Most Fees.
Top 5 Crypto Investments, Ranked by Fees
Ethereum
Think of Ethereum as a “world computer” that allows you to run shared applications. Ethereum users pay transaction fees, known as gas fees, to use the computer (i.e., carry out transactions on the Ethereum network). The more people use Ethereum, the more fees the network generates.
As shown in the chart below, Ethereum fees have remained relatively stable over the past year (except in March 2024, when Ethereum completed its Dencun upgrade).
Ethereum gas fees can sometimes be incredibly high due to network congestion, especially during major events. This is why Layer 2 solutions are gaining popularity: they offload some of this work to alternative blockchains, which record your transactions on Ethereum in a more cost-effective way.
In the long run, these L2s are good for Ethereum as they reduce fees and speed up transactions – but in the meantime, some of Ethereum’s fee revenue is consumed by L2s. (See our Investor’s Guide to Layer-2s here.)
Tron
Like Ethereum, Tron is an open-source decentralized blockchain that can execute smart contracts and run decentralized applications (dApps).
Tron generates fees each time a transaction is performed, and costs are based on energy, bandwidth, and transaction type.
In February 2024, Tron’s fee revenue reached an all-time high of $1.8 million, driven by Tron’s regular token burn events, where more than 12 million TRX tokens were removed from circulation. While transaction fees are still charged on the Tron network, a portion of them are regularly used to buy back and burn TRX tokens, reducing supply and theoretically increasing the value of TRX.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin is the OG cryptocurrency. Bitcoin fees are measured in satoshis per byte, where a satoshi is the smallest unit of bitcoin, and are calculated based on transaction size and user demand for block space. Transaction fees are paid to incentivize miners to validate transactions on the blockchain.
As you can see in the chart below, bitcoin saw a spike in fees in March and April 2024. On April 20, bitcoin transaction fees reached a historical average of $128, coinciding with bitcoin’s fourth halving by halving and the launch of Runes, a new protocol that allows users to create fungible tokens on the bitcoin blockchain. However, rates saw a significant drop the following month as demand for Runes decreased.
Lido Finance
Lido Finance is a liquid staking protocol on the Ethereum blockchain, making it easy for users to stake their ETH and earn rewards. (See our guide to investing in Lido here).
Lido charges a flat 10% fee split between node operators and the DAO treasury. The rate can be changed by the DAO pending a successful vote.
Lido Finance fees have remained relatively stable over the past year, with a small increase in March-April 2024 coinciding with an increase in the token’s price. However, Lido network fees experienced the biggest increase in March and May 2023 when investors were finally able to withdraw their staked ETH.
Uniswap
Uniswap is a decentralized exchange protocol that uses liquidity pools and automated market makers (AMMs) to facilitate peer-to-peer trading. (See our Investor’s Guide to Uniswap here.)
Uniswap charges fees for each trade, distributed proportionally to liquidity providers in a pool. As you will notice from the chart, its fees skyrocketed in April 2024 when it increased its trading fees from 0.15% to 0.25%. The increase will provide long-term financing for potential legal costs and ongoing development.
The relationship between fees and project success
Fees are often directly related to the success of a crypto company.
Fees can be a crucial indicator of a blockchain project’s usefulness, demand, and long-term stability. Fee generation is proof of product/market fit as it shows that users are willing to pay for the services offered by a crypto company.
Additionally, protocols that generate substantial income from fees are more likely to be stable over the long term, as they have a demonstrable revenue stream to support growth and operations.
As an investor, rate analysis can provide a solid foundation for evaluating cryptocurrencies, helping you move beyond speculation. This can lead to more informed investment decisions as studying the growth or decline of rates can help you identify overvalued or undervalued crypto projects.
Conclusion for investors
For individual investors, we recommend avoiding fees whenever possible. (See our guide at How to Avoid Crypto Fees.)
But when we look for big crypto companies to invest in, fees are one of our most important metrics.
Mostly, the fees are good: they show that people are willing to pay for the platform. However, be aware that fees can present barriers, especially for small transactions. They can indicate network congestion, a constant problem for Ethereum and others.
Before investing in a crypto project, we suggest studying its transaction fees and how they are increasing or decreasing. And to learn more about which crypto projects are earning the most fees, stay subscribed to our Bitcoin Market Journal Newsletter.
Bitcoin
RIOT, MARA and CLSK shares at risk
Bitcoin (BTC) Mining stocks like Riot Platforms (RIOT), Marathon Digital (MARA) and CleanSpark (CLSK) retreated in pre-market trading as BTC retreated.
RIOT, MARA and CLSK all fell more than 2%, while other crypto-related stocks such as MicroStrategy (MSTR) and Coinbase (COIN) fell 1.5%.
Bitcoin sell-off continues
Crypto-linked stocks retreated as Bitcoin resumed its downtrend on Wednesday. After rising to $63,750 on Monday, BTC is hovering at $60,0000 and it is unclear whether it will recover.
More importantly, Bitcoin is dangerously close to the crucial support at $58,273, which is the 200-day Exponential Moving Average (EMA). The next support level for Bitcoin is $56,426, representing its lowest level in May.
Bitcoin Price Chart
If Bitcoin drops below this price, it will be a sign that the bears have prevailed, which could take it to the $50,000 level, if not below.
This decline happened after a whale deposited nearly 2,000 Bitcoins to Binance in two separate transactions. While this isn’t always the case, deposits to exchanges often happen when holders are exiting their positions.
The whales’ action coincided with a period in which the German government continues to sell off its Bitcoin holdings. It transferred $52 million worth of coins to exchanges on Tuesday.
As a result, data from CoinGlass shows that the volume of Bitcoin balances on exchanges has started to increase. The volume rose to 2.49 million on Tuesday, from last month’s low of 2.47 million.
Bitcoin balances on exchanges
Bitcoin Mining Companies at Risk
If the Bitcoin sell-off continues, it will put Bitcoin mining companies like Marathon, CleanSpark, and Riot Platforms at risk. These companies have tended to have a close correlation with Bitcoin in the past.
This drop is happening a few months after the halving event, reducing the amount of Bitcoins that miners receive.
To compensate for this drop, most of these companies have added their mining equipment. CleanSpark has reached a hash rate of 20 EH/swhich helped her mine 445 coins in June after mining 417 coins the previous month. She did this after purchasing 5 mining sites in Georgia.
Digital Marathon mined 590 coins in June, down 40% from the same month in 2023 and flat from May.
Riot Platforms, on the other hand, focused on acquiring Bitfarms, a company that mined 189 coins in June.
Bitcoin
Michael Saylor Issues Statement on Bitcoin Amid Crypto Market Sell-Off by U.Today
U.Today – Amid an ongoing sell-off in the cryptocurrency market, Michael Saylor, a prominent advocate and president of MicroStrategy, made a statement on X (Twitter) that reverberated across the crypto space: “Just Bitcoin.”
This two-word tweet comes as the cryptocurrency market faces significant sell-offs as the price of Bitcoin plummets.
Bitcoin, the largest cryptocurrency by market value, began its decline in Tuesday’s trading session, hitting $63,223 at one point before falling further.
Losses deepened on Wednesday as investors considered remarks from Fed Chair Jerome Powell, with Bitcoin hitting intraday lows of $59,509. At the time of writing, BTC is down 2.85% over the past 24 hours to $60,274.
According to data from CoinGlass, the sell-off has resulted in a significant amount of cryptocurrencies being liquidated in the past 24 hours, totaling over $166 million. However, this has not deterred Saylor’s confidence in Bitcoin, as he reiterates his longing for the crypto asset in his tweet.
Cryptocurrency market crashes
Cryptocurrencies fell on Tuesday after Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank needs to see more progress on inflation before cutting interest rates, which are now at 5.25%-5.50%. Powell revealed at a monetary symposium in Sintra, Portugal, that the United States is moving closer to a disinflationary path.
“We want to be more confident that inflation is moving sustainably downward toward 2% before we begin the process of tapering or easing policy,” Powell said.
Market losses deepened after Wednesday’s economic releases that indicated the labor market is cooling. Recent data showed weaker-than-expected private payroll growth in June, but weekly jobless claims were higher than economists had forecast. The latest figures come ahead of the highly anticipated June nonfarm payrolls report on Friday.
As the cryptocurrency market goes through a period of uncertainty, the coming days and weeks will be crucial in determining the direction of BTC’s price.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin and Ethereum in GTA 6? Still rumors — for now
Rumors that the long-awaited Grand Theft Auto 6 will use cryptocurrency that has been circulating for more than a year now—and they’re spinning again.
On Wednesday, a pseudonymous Crypto Twitter influencer named Gordon — apparently named after Gordon Gekko from the iconic 1987 film “Wall Street” —shared to his nearly 500,000 followers that “GTA 6 will allow cryptocurrency payments” and that “so far only Bitcoin, EthereumIt is USDT [are] confirmed.”
But in reality, no cryptocurrency has been confirmed for Grand Theft Auto 6, despite ongoing chatter about the rumors. Rockstar Games and parent company Take-Two have made no such announcements this week on the subject, nor have they made any prior announcements, and official trailers and announcements have made no mention of cryptocurrency being included.
However, the tweet — which also included a fake trailer for the game — quickly went viral, with over 500,000 views as of this writing in a matter of hours. When Twitter users asked Gordon for his sources, he would jokingly respond that his “uncle works there” or say that previous reports on the matter were “old” at this point.
But really, nothing has changed since then. DecipherGG’s reported in previous rumors in May 2023, not even since the first official trailer — which initially leaked with “BUY BTC” stamped on itApparently by the leaker in question—premiered last December.
DecipherGG reached out to Rockstar Games for comment but did not receive an immediate response.
Could Grand Theft Auto 6 implement a crypto element when it releases in 2025? It’s certainly possible, and if so, it would be a transformative moment for cryptocurrency adoption by the traditional gaming industry.
Take-Two Interactive has explored the space before, acquiring casual gaming giant Zynga in early 2022, when Take-Two founder and CEO Strauss Zelnick suggested there were “Web3 opportunities” that they could explore better as a team. Zynga has launched its first blockchain game on Ethereum, called Sugartownbut Take-Two has yet to get involved with other brands.
Rockstar Games, on the other hand, prohibited the use of cryptocurrency or NFTs on player-run Grand Theft Auto 5 servers in late 2022, following a rise in the use of NFTs to represent unique player-owned assets on modded game servers.
And given Grand Theft Auto’s satirical tone, the game may be more likely to criticize cryptocurrency and poke fun at caricatures of crypto fans and NFTs, for example, rather than trying to launch its own on-chain currency. But that’s all speculation at this point, as there are relatively few official details about GTA 6.
For now, at least, don’t believe the hype. While Rockstar Games hasn’t officially closed the door on cryptocurrency usage in Grand Theft Auto 6, it hasn’t confirmed anything about it either. However, it’s sure to remain a hot topic in the long run leading up to release, which is currently scheduled for fall 2025.
Edited by Ryan Ozawa.
Bitcoin
Crypto President Trump’s ‘Lesser’ Regulation Will Bless Coinbase’s Bitcoin Leverage, Expert Says – Coinbase Glb (NASDAQ:COIN)
Chris SenyekChief Investment Strategist at Wolfe Researchrecently expressed his opinion on the potential impact of a Donald Trump win the 2024 elections in the cryptocurrency market.
What happened: Senyek suggested that a Trump presidency could ease cryptocurrency regulations, benefiting companies like Coinbase Global Inc. COIN due to its importance Bitcoin BTC/USD Leverage.
“Trump would be less harsh on crypto regulation, and Coinbase would be a big beneficiary of that given its influence on bitcoin,” Senyek said during CNBC’s “Last Call” on Tuesday.
See too: Enhance Your Retirement Portfolio: The Benefits of Adding Cryptocurrency
Why does this matter?:Senyek’s comments come in the context of the former president Donald Trump‘s reported plans to participate at the Bitcoin 2024 convention, which could reinforce his image as a “Crypto President”.
Trump’s potential participation in the Bitcoin 2024 convention, a major event on the cryptocurrency calendar, could have significant implications for the industry.
Pratik KalaHead of Research in DigitalX Limitedhe has predicted a Trump victory in the upcoming elections, but warns that immediate cryptocurrency-friendly regulations may not be a priority.
A recent report by 10x Search explore the recent rise in Bitcoin price and its potential connection to Trump’s strong position in the 2024 election race. The report, titled “Is the Bitcoin Trump Pump Sustainable?”, highlights a 4% spike in Bitcoin’s price following the news that the president Joe Biden will remain in the race despite a poor performance in the presidential debate.
Price Action: At the time of writing, Bitcoin was trading 2.10% lower at $60,860.66, according to Benzinga Pro.
Read next:
Image created using photos from Shutterstock
This story was generated using Benzinga Neuro and edited by Pooja Rajkumari
News and market data brought to you by Benzinga’s APIs
© 2024 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
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