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Litecoin (LTC), one of the digital currency ecosystem's oldest Layer 1 protocols, has hit an historic milestone in terms of the total number of transactions it has processed. According to an update it shared earlier, the blockchain network said a total of 160 million transactions have been processed since its inception, an indication of its broad embrace in its 12-year history.
The Litecoin network just processed its 160 millionth transaction!
— Litecoin (@litecoin) May 24, 2023
That's over 10 million transactions in the last six weeks!!
⚡ $LTC ⚡ pic.twitter.com/OqGWoEczLm
The Litecoin protocol was designed to serve as a payment token, and all these years, the blockchain has served its purpose without disruption. Time and again, Litecoin has boasted of being one of the few protocols that has maintained a reliable uptrend since its launch, a feature that has made it more attractive to users across the board.
Litecoin has evolved over the past year as new innovations are beginning to make their way into the network. Besides its core payment role, Litecoin has also introduced LTC-20 token standard as a way of encouraging the growth of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) in the network.
The current woes of the Bitcoin network have also added to the massive embrace of Litecoin by users who typically carry out crypto transactions. With the major milestone, the potential impact on the price of the asset remains a subject up for debate.
Halving impact
The growth of Litecoin transactions is about to be complemented by the forthcoming halving event that the protocol is set to undergo in less than 70 days. Halving is a network event in which the reward given to miners of proof-of-work (PoW) protocols like Litecoin are slashed by half.
As programmed into the core code, the halving event takes place every four years, with the coming event notably the third the protocol will experience. The halving event has been linked to higher price growth, and there are growing projections that this upcoming one will not be an exception.
Litecoin is changing hands at $84.32, down 2.17% at the time of writing, per data from CoinMarketCap.