Crypto exchange Binance temporarily halted Bitcoin (BTC) withdrawals for the second time on May 8 due to a large backlog of pending transactions. Binance tweeted that the transactions were still pending as its set fees did not anticipate the recent surge in Bitcoin network gas fees. The exchange provided an update almost two hours after its initial tweet and said it was “replacing the pending Bitcoin withdrawal transactions with a higher fee so that they get picked up by mining pools.”
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.
We’ll provide updates here.
— Binance (@binance) May 8, 2023
Nearly three hours after its first tweet, Binance said Bitcoin withdrawals had resumed with pending transactions being processed with higher transaction fees. It added that it was working on enabling withdrawals via the Lightning Network, which it claimed could help mitigate such withdrawal halts in the future.
To prevent a similar recurrence in the future, our fees have been adjusted. We will continue to monitor on-chain activity and adjust accordingly if needed.
Our team has also been working on enabling BTC Lightning Network withdrawals, which will help in such situations.
— Binance (@binance) May 8, 2023
Earlier on May 7, Binance also had to temporarily suspend Bitcoin withdrawals due to an overflow of transactions on the blockchain. The price of Bitcoin also fell around 3.5% from its weekly high of over $29,700 on May 6, as per Cointelegraph data.
A spokesperson for Binance told Cointelegraph it had “no additional details to add at this time.”
