Benzinga | Sep 14, 2021 04:14PM EDT

$2B In Bitcoin Moved For Just 78 Cents In Transaction Fees

A single Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) transaction worth over $2 billion was processed for under $1.

What Happened: According to data from Blockchain.com, more than 44,500 BTC worth $2,011,009,391 moved from one anonymous crypto wallet to another for as little as 78 cents in transaction fees.

An international transfer of the same size would typically involve a transfer fee of between 1% and 3%. Even a transfer fee of 1% on a $2-billion transfer would cost at least $20 million and take between one and four days to process.

Despite surging to a record high of $62 earlier this year, the average transfer fee on the Bitcoin blockchain is now as low as $2, according to data from BitInfoCharts.

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele estimated that if the country's citizens adopt Bitcoin at scale, then remittance service providers like The Western Union Company (NYSE:WU) could lose as much as $400 million a year.

"Wherever you are now, you can send bitcoin to anyone with a Chivo wallet in El Salvador, and in minutes, they have the value and then they can go to one of the ATMs and take it out in cash without a fee," said Alex Gladstein, chief strategy officer for the Human Rights Foundation.

"That's drop-dead stunning. It's an incredible humanitarian improvement."

Price Action: At press time, Bitcoin was trading at a price of $46,590.