Over the past week, there’s been heightened tension around the conversation about bitcoin fees and confirmation times. Many individuals have been complaining about unconfirmed transactions and average median transaction fees, costing $31-52 USD on December 23. With bitcoin being divisible by eight decimals, many of those decimals are rendered useless as small amounts of satoshis held on wallets can never be spent unless fees subside. 

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The discussion about fees and confirmation times has gotten hectic as people are complaining about network fees spiking above the $30 region for just a basic 226-byte transaction. At the time of writing, there are unconfirmed according to Blockchain.info, and that number is lower due to the weekend lulls. 

 Businesses that deal with bitcoin like Coinbase, Bitpay, and Shapeshift are all telling their users about the delays. Bitpay initially required its card users to load more than $100 worth of bitcoin because of high fees. The company changed it’s mind and reverted back to $5 invoices and card loads, but stated it still recommended higher payments. Shapeshift is requesting people shift more than $250 worth of BTC in order to swap for another cryptocurrency. Shapeshift’s CEO Erik Voorhees is not pleased with the fee market situation