I just took a look at the mempool size shown at btc.com, there is no drop visible.
Seemst to be only blockchain.info who shows that strange behaviour.
Maybe it's really a rejection of transactions with small fees.
But what I really don't understand is that the size of the mempool on blockchain.info is increasing while it stays constant on btc.com.
I have also take a look at btc.com.
What is strange (and not really understandable for me) that according to this chart, most of the transactions (69K) are sent with a fee under 20 sat/B
Seems like only a few transaction are over the 20 sat/B fee limit, so I'm not sure what the truth is now.
It's possible that blockchain.info just don't count with those transactions with small fees, like it was mentioned above.
I just sent a transaction with an average 285 sat/B fee (not so high, but defenately not cheap...) I'm curoius what will happen with it, how long will it take to get confirmed... we'll see... but if those transacitons are really sent with so low fee, it's possible that mine will get confirmed in a few hours time. (EDIT: I have 4 confirmations in half an hour time)
I'm wondering, 1 sat/B is also under 20 sat/B, so what could be the fee of those 69K transacitons...
P.S.:
@BrewMaster: I like your previous avatar