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Dogecoin Price Hits a Stride Amid Proposal to Slash Fees

By:
Gerelyn Terzo
Updated: Jun 28, 2021, 12:38 UTC

Dogecoin developers have proposed slashing the average transaction fees by 100x on the blockchain.

Dogecoin

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Dogecoin is trading about 4% higher alongside leading cryptocurrency bitcoin, to which it is often compared. While bitcoin is the first cryptocurrency, Dogecoin has been gaining popularity as the narrative shifts toward the meme coin’s sustainability and speedy transaction times outperforming its larger peer. Now investors have yet another reason to pile into DOGE — potentially lower fees.

100x Cheaper DOGE Transactions

The Dogecoin team would like to make it easier for users to transact in DOGE as exchange rates vs. USD and BTC have changed the dynamic, making it pricier to send the sixth-biggest cryptocurrency. The developers have proposed slashing  average transaction fees by “100x for standard transactions on the Dogecoin chain.”

The Dogecoin community is mulling the fee-change proposal, which could secure DOGE’s role in the future of the cryptocurrency ecosystem even further. As it stands, Dogecoin transactions are already cheap. They have been known to cost less than a penny, though they most recently go for USD 0.492, as per BitInfoCharts.com.

The proposal was submitted on Github by Dogecoin core developer Patrick Lodder, the coding change for which was spearheaded by developer Michi Lumin. It has won the support of much of the DOGE community, including the “Dogefather” himself, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who tweeted that the fee change “is important to support.”

Source: Twitter

In addition to Musk, the fee change proposal also won the support of Dogecoin co-creator Billy Markus, who goes by the handle Shibetoshi Nakamoto on Twitter. Markus reminded the Dogecoin community that he set the fee model to “1 DOGE in 2013 after a spam attack” and that “it would be cool to see it get reduced eight years later!”

While DOGE transactions would be next to nothing, spamming the network would cost a minimum of 3x as much as year-ago levels based on the current rate of exchange, as per Lodder.

More Competitive DOGE

The Dogecoin team has introduced the proposed fee changes in an attempt to keep the network competitive with Litecoin and bitcoin. According to the proposal,

“Where transacting DOGE used to be 10x cheaper than transacting LTC, it is as of ting nearly 5x more expensive. Therefore, it makes sense to reduce fees by at least 50x to stay competitive.”

Included in the proposal are the following potential changes:

  • “Lower the minimal relay fee to 0.001 DOGE”
  • “Lower the dust limit to 0.01 DOGE” (the amount left over from a transaction)
  • “Set the default block inclusion fee rate to 0.01 DOGE”
  • “Bring back a functional free transaction space”
  • “Lower the default fee rate to 0.01 DOGE”

Dogecoin developers are addressing fees while the cost to send Ether or bitcoin has been on the decline of late. The lower DOGE fees could incentivize users to transact more feverishly on-chain rather than stashing their coins away on Coinbase or some other centralized exchange.

About the Author

Gerelyn is a cryptocurrency and blockchain journalist who has been engaged in the space since mid-2017 when bitcoin was embarking on its first major bull run

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