You pay gas fees to transfer funds or mint an NFT—but who gets that money?
【The basics】Ethereum is a computer shared by the whole world. Every operation (transferring funds, trading, running
a contract) uses computing resources. Gas is what you pay the validators who perform those computations for you.
“Fuel costs.” The more congested the network, the more people compete to get their transactions processed, and the higher the gas price (the price per unit of gas).
【Why it’s related to coin prices】A red-hot market → a surge in on-chain transactions → gas fees skyrocket. That’s why experienced users
have a habit: they do on-chain operations late at night or when the market is quiet. The same operation can cost half as much.
【Investment relevance】Gas fee levels are a real-time thermometer of on-chain activity. Persistently high gas fees =
strong on-chain demand; prolonged quiet = reduced app usage. Treat this as a supplementary way to gauge on-chain sentiment—
pretty interesting.
What do you think? Share your experiences in the comments.