Bitcoin User Pays $3.1M Transaction Fee for 139 BTC Transfer

Bitcoin user mistakenly pays $3.1 million transaction fee

A Bitcoin user recently made a costly mistake when transferring 139.42 BTC, paying a whopping $3.1 million in transaction fees. This incident marks the eighth-highest transaction fee in Bitcoin's 14-year history.

Details of the transaction

The user attempted to transfer the BTC from the wallet address bc1qn3d...wekrnl to bc1qyf...km36t4 on November 23. However, instead of paying the standard fee, they paid more than half of the actual value in fees. As a result, the destination address only received 55.77 BTC. The mining pool Antpool processed this transaction fee on block 818087.

Reasons behind the high fee

While some speculate that the sender intentionally selected the high fee, it seems that the replace-by-fee (RBF) node policy and the sender's lack of awareness also played a role. The RBF feature allows users to replace an unconfirmed transaction in the mempool with a new one that includes a higher fee, ensuring faster processing. However, once a transaction is sent with RBF, it cannot be canceled. It is possible that the user repeatedly attempted to replace the fee, hoping to cancel it. The RBF history shows that the last replacement increased the fee by an additional 20%, adding 12.54824636 BTC in fees.

A recurring mistake

This incident is not the first time a Bitcoin user has accidentally paid an exorbitant transaction fee. In September, the exchange platform Paxos accidentally paid a $500,000 fee for a $2,000 BTC transfer. Fortunately, the miner who verified the transaction returned the accidental fee to Paxos. However, this recent incident marks the largest Bitcoin transaction fee ever paid in dollar terms, surpassing the previous record of $500,000.

Antpool's response

It is unclear whether Antpool, the mining pool responsible for processing the transaction, will return the funds. Their response will depend on their payout policies and any obligations they have towards sharing transaction fees with their miners. Antpool has yet to comment on the issue or respond to requests for comment from Cointelegraph.