The BRC-20 token standard for Bitcoin has emerged as the newest fashion in the cryptocurrency industry, particularly in light of the recent growth of the Pepe joke coin. The BRC-20 standard has been used to produce 8,500 distinct tokens, the bulk of which are meme coins like Pepe and Meme.
The Bitcoin (BTC) network now has an experimental token standard called BRC-20 that is based on Ethereum’s ERC-20. By using the Ordinals protocol, it enables programmers to design and send fungible tokens.The BRC-20 token standard is substantially different from its Ethereum-based version, despite being modeled after ERC-20. Smart contracts are not implemented in BRC-20 coins. To create and exchange these tokens according to the token standard, you need a Bitcoin wallet.
The BRC-20 token standard was developed by Domo, an anonymous on-chain analyzer, in the beginning of March of this year. The goal was to enable the issuance and transfer of fungible tokens on the Bitcoin blockchain. BRC-20 tokens’ market capitalization has skyrocketed over the past month and is currently sitting at $120 million, up 600% from the previous week.
Market cap for BRC-20 tokens.
The number of BRC-20 token transactions on the blockchain has likewise surpassed that of the initial Bitcoin transactions. Between April 29 and May 2, the number of BRC-20 transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain exceeded regular BTC transactions by more than 50%.
The BRC-20 coin volume reached its peak on May 1 with 366,000 transactions, and there have been 2.36 million transactions overall on the network.
volume of BRC-20 token transactions.
Due to the new token activity, there has been an increase in both the volume of BRC-20 transactions and the transaction costs. The network has produced an extra 109.7 BTC in transaction fees for miners since its launch in late April.
fees in BRC-20 tokens total.
Although the meme coin craze has been a prominent topic on the Ethereum (ETH) blockchain, a similar trend is now being seen on the Bitcoin blockchain thanks to the growth of the BRC-20 standard. The meme coin craze has also significantly increased Ethereum network gas prices, which has caused network congestion.