Binance halts Bitcoin withdrawals for several hours on Monday
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Binance, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges by trading volumes, suspended Bitcoin withdrawals for several hours on Monday. The exchange attributed the matter to heavy trading volumes and increased processing fees. The exchange later cleared the withdrawal backlog at a higher cost.
Binance halts Bitcoin withdrawals
Binance, the largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volumes, suspended BTC withdrawals on Monday several times. The exchange attributed the decision to a backlog of pending transactions because it had not provided miners on the network with an ample reward to log the trades on the blockchain.
The halt in Bitcoin withdrawals led to the price of Bitcoin dropping significantly despite the marginal losses reported by the exchange. In the last 24 hours, the price of Bitcoin has dropped by 3.1%, and the coin was trading at $27,976 at the time of writing, which is the lowest price level for the coin in nearly a week.
“There is a large volume of withdrawal transactions from Binance still pending as our set fees did not anticipate the recent surge in BTC network gas fees. Our team is working to accelerate the confirmation of all pending transactions,” Binance tweeted.
The exchange also said it was working on ensuring that a similar occurrence does not happen in the future, adding that its fees had been adjusted. The exchange will also continue monitoring on-chain activity and adjusting accordingly. The team is also working to enable withdrawals using the Bitcoin Lighting network, which will help if a similar situation happens.
When it comes to processing payments on the blockchain, the size of the withdrawal amount will determine the gas fee needed to process the transactions on the network. The gas fees are significantly high, especially during network congestions when high transaction volumes are being processed.
Binance halted withdrawals for around one hour on late Sunday. It later resumed withdrawals before announcing yet another stoppage on Monday. The Binance exchange said that to prevent a similar recurrence in the future, it had adjusted its fees.
It is not the first time Binance has suspended deposits and withdrawals because of technical issues on the exchange. The 24-hour trading volumes on the Binance exchange reached $6.9 billion, according to data from CoinMarketCap. The volumes were over eight times higher compared to the second-largest exchange.
Binance to integrate the Lightning network
The Binance exchange has also said that it is exploring the integration of the Bitcoin Lightning Network to speed up the time needed to process withdrawals. The Lightning network speeds up transactions on the Bitcoin blockchain and ensures that the fees charged on the network are significantly lower.
The Bitcoin Lightning Network works similarly to other networks. The users on the network can process withdrawals through Lightning from the Binance exchange and into their private wallets.
