Ripple CTO Reacts to Mysterious 410M XRP Transfer with Strange 20 XRP Gas Fee

Ripple CTO suggests reasons for the unusual 20 XRP fee associated with a mysterious 410M XRP transaction that raised questions.

A surprising and massive XRP transaction has sparked considerable curiosity among the XRP Army due to its unusual details. The development has prompted Ripple’s Chief Technology Officer David Schwartz to offer additional insights to unravel the details of the transactions. 

Specifically, pro-XRP crypto enthusiast Saul recently took to X to share his discovery while exploring XRP Scan, a prominent XRPL explorer.

He claimed to have noticed the activation of an XRP address on Oct. 11. However, what raised his curiosity was the astonishing inflow of 410 million XRP into the newly created wallet alongside the associated fee.

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In particular, the transfer of 410 million XRP valued at over $203 million featured an uncommon transaction fee of 20 XRP. This 20 XRP paid for gas raised eyebrows because the standard fee for XRP transactions is a mere 0.00001 XRP.

As a result, Saul brought the issue to the attention of the XRP community. He directed his inquiry to Vet, a prominent XRP Ledger validator.

“Is it normal for a payment like this to have a 20 XRP fee,” Saul asked. Vet responded that a 410 million XRP transaction should not have a 20 XRP fee. “It is an overkill,” he remarked. 

No definitely not! 20 xrp fee is overkill.

— Vet 🏴‍☠️ (@Vet_X0) October 11, 2023

Ripple CTO Weighs In

The post also grabbed the interest of Ripple’s CTO, who shared insights on the peculiar transaction. Specifically, Schwartz raised the possibility of an error.

He proposed that the sender’s intention could have been to establish the fee at 20 drops but, possibly due to a miscalculation, ended up setting it a million times higher. Note that the standard transaction fee of 0.00001 XRP translates to 10 drops.

I wonder if they meant to set the fee to 20 drops and were off by a factor a million.

— David “JoelKatz” Schwartz (@JoelKatz) October 11, 2023

To provide context, XRP does not necessitate a purchase of a whole unit to make a transaction. DROP represents the smallest denomination of XRP, where 1 XRP equals 1,000,000 drops.

Meanwhile, the official X account of XRP Scan provided context to the mysterious transaction fee. According to XRP Scan, the sender may have aimed to deplete their account balance to zero by utilizing a 20 XRP transaction fee. The statement read:

“They’re trying to bring their account balance to 0 by burning account reserve. Probably unaware of updated account reserve requirement and AccountDelete transaction.”

Regardless of the error source, some crypto enthusiasts expressed that a 20 XRP fee worth $9.904 is still too cheap for a transaction valued at over $200 million. This discourse underscores the XRPL’s impressively low transaction fee.