Fee is larger than transaction now. Bitcoin is broken?

[emsi]

Today I wanted to send out the bitcoins that were accumulating on one of my wallets. I was receiving there micropaymants for web ads. Unfortunately I'm not able to send any of it out (a 0.05 in total, not much but still ~50 bucks). I'm using armory and it calculated the fee of over a 1BTC for it (like 20 times greater that the transaction amount!!!). I tried to decrease the transaction but no matter what I do I end up network rejecting my transaction. All the incoming transaction are for 0.0001 or slightly more. The rejected transactions are not very huge, the average looks like thsi:
Transaction: TxHash: 025c0ffe015a8e6a35a9e7bc9018e786194ef0e3a055c7507a38f840f5938902 (BE) Version: 1 nInputs: 3 nOutputs: 2 LockTime: 0 Inputs: PyTxIn: PrevTxHash: f405598c0580cea546c73a9ed5e52347f3a07a3cb4d8b01b50a647f7438458a9 (BE) TxOutIndex: 31 Script: (4830450220019b4a6a32918f3bf72b8e67ec55cb6cd3aa97fc30dc3c8794c2be) Sender: 1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX Seq: 4294967295 PyTxIn: PrevTxHash: 86ea39dc35303a47b57689acaa8f96274ff5cc2412bc5e4c254c15ce6bfa1321 (BE) TxOutIndex: 29 Script: (483045022100b29a0b29202e19f2dc651b3ec842a8b72a3d39c3f41d14ee9445) Sender: 1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX Seq: 4294967295 PyTxIn: PrevTxHash: dd9da02bbb566681162f9956f6c2d6e47d2d0428098a2c0aba9ba4cb25ddc91e (BE) TxOutIndex: 74 Script: (483045022100aab39ac4adba537d9d441b7f92f11b66554ff2573ba3871a2285) Sender: 1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX Seq: 4294967295 Outputs: TxOut: Value: 8780 (8.78e-05) Script: OP_DUP OP_HASH160 (1Dcu2y3eefKRVkJY7JSJeaouRyEnBYaWJt) OP_EQUALVERIFY OP_CHECKSIG TxOut: Value: 53270 (0.0005327) Script: OP_DUP OP_HASH160 (1N7afkxPv9b4CRaTwecqwHisRH7yMUPQvF) OP_EQUALVERIFY OP_CHECKSIG

I think it's already too late for many wallets (like mine) with dozens of 0.0001BTC to get consolidated.

• How can I keep retrying the transaction? Currently if I try to send it gets rejected very shortly afterwards. (I'm using Armory).
  
• It looks like Bitcoin is fundamentaly broken. Miners are ruling and ruining it simultaneously because they have no viable alternative to offset their losses.
  

[1715096062]

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[pedrog]

You can try your luck and make a transaction with low fee, but looking at the network right now it will be dropped, just wait until sometime when the network isn't congested.

This morning was ideal for such transaction, there were very few transactions waiting.

[0xfff]

How much does it cost with 0.0001BTC/KB? If it isn't much you can use https://www.viabtc.com/tools/txaccelerator/ to get it into a block.

Alternatively, you could create a transaction and then write a script to continuously attempt to submit it to the blockchain until it is accepted. Use one of these
https://blockchain.info/pushtx
https://blockr.io/tx/push
https://live.blockcypher.com/btc/pushtx/
That's what I would do.

[emsi]

You can try your luck and make a transaction with low fee, but looking at the network right now it will be dropped, just wait until sometime when the network isn't congested.

This morning was ideal for such transaction, there were very few transactions waiting.

I tried this morning. Last Friday the fee for sending out 0.05 was over 1BTC, this morning it was like 0.1, still twice the amount to send!
Even it were ten times lower (which seems it is not going to happen ever again) a puny 0.01 it'd be a 20% which still is ridiculous.

[Lucius]

I hope you know that fee you need to pay depends from how you receive your founds,in this case you say this amount is collected from many micropayments you geting over the some time,so transaction fee in your case is much bigger.

If you need you founds quick try with some bigger fee,how much fee you included in your transactions which are rejected?There is ViaBTC accelerating tool which maybe can help to you.Try to play with different fees,or wait some time and try again.

[calkob]

If you are not in a rush just put the standard fee and it will eventually get added to a block. i do it all the time and i have waited 4 days one time.  But bitcoin is not broken it is just not what you want it to be. 

[pedrog]

You can try your luck and make a transaction with low fee, but looking at the network right now it will be dropped, just wait until sometime when the network isn't congested.

This morning was ideal for such transaction, there were very few transactions waiting.

I tried this morning. Last Friday the fee for sending out 0.05 was over 1BTC, this morning it was like 0.1, still twice the amount to send!
Even it were ten times lower (which seems it is not going to happen ever again) a puny 0.01 it'd be a 20% which still is ridiculous.

Maybe you need to drop some inputs, does Armory has coincontrol?

If so you can select which inputs to include in a transaction, drop less than 3000 satoshi inputs, this may help.

[achow101]

For the transaction that you posted, did Armory suggest that you use a transaction fee that is over 1 BTC? If it did, that's probably a bug.

What version of Armory are you using?

Maybe you need to drop some inputs, does Armory has coincontrol?

If you enable Expert mode, you can access coin control and select the inputs that you want to use.

[DannyHamilton]

I was receiving there micropaymants for web ads.

Don't do this.

It is a waste of time.

You are causing your future transactions to be very large and therefore very expensive.  You'll end up spending more on transaction fees than you'll make.  It isn't worth the effort.

- snip -
using armory and it calculated the fee of over a 1BTC for it
- snip -
The rejected transactions are not very huge, the average looks like this:

Code:

Transaction:
  TxHash: 025c0ffe015a8e6a35a9e7bc9018e786194ef0e3a055c7507a38f840f5938902 (BE)
  Version: 1
  nInputs: 3
  nOutputs: 2
  LockTime: 0
  Inputs:
    PyTxIn:
      PrevTxHash: f405598c0580cea546c73a9ed5e52347f3a07a3cb4d8b01b50a647f7438458a9 (BE)
      TxOutIndex: 31
      Script: (4830450220019b4a6a32918f3bf72b8e67ec55cb6cd3aa97fc30dc3c8794c2be)
      Sender: 1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
      Seq: 4294967295
    PyTxIn:
      PrevTxHash: 86ea39dc35303a47b57689acaa8f96274ff5cc2412bc5e4c254c15ce6bfa1321 (BE)
      TxOutIndex: 29
      Script: (483045022100b29a0b29202e19f2dc651b3ec842a8b72a3d39c3f41d14ee9445)
      Sender: 1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
      Seq: 4294967295
    PyTxIn:
      PrevTxHash: dd9da02bbb566681162f9956f6c2d6e47d2d0428098a2c0aba9ba4cb25ddc91e (BE)
      TxOutIndex: 74
      Script: (483045022100aab39ac4adba537d9d441b7f92f11b66554ff2573ba3871a2285)
      Sender: 1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
      Seq: 4294967295
  Outputs:
    TxOut: Value: 8780 (8.78e-05)
    Script: OP_DUP OP_HASH160 (1Dcu2y3eefKRVkJY7JSJeaouRyEnBYaWJt) OP_EQUALVERIFY OP_CHECKSIG
    TxOut: Value: 53270 (0.0005327)
    Script: OP_DUP OP_HASH160 (1N7afkxPv9b4CRaTwecqwHisRH7yMUPQvF) OP_EQUALVERIFY OP_CHECKSIG

Sounds like you've got some sort of bug in your wallet software.

A transaction like that shouldn't be much larger than 525 bytes.

A reasonable fee for a 525 byte transaction right now would be about 0.000945 BTC.  That's less than $1 fee.

It looks like Bitcoin is fundamentaly broken. Miners are ruling and ruining it simultaneously because they have no viable alternative to offset their losses.

Something you are using is broken if you aren't able to send a 525 byte transaction with a fee of less than 0.001 BTC.  It isn't bitcoin that's broken though.

[DannyHamilton]

- snip -
it calculated the fee of over a 1BTC for it
- snip -
The rejected transactions are not very huge, the average looks like this:
- snip -

After a bit more investigation, I've found that this is demonstrably NOT TRUE.

The example transaction that you posted spends a total of 0.00063050 in inputs.  It would be IMPOSSSIBLE for that transaction to have a fee of 1 BTC.

The example transaction that you posted creates a total of 0.00062050 in new unspent outputs (0.0000878 to 1Dcu2y3eefKRVkJY7JSJeaouRyEnBYaWJt and 0.0005327 to 1N7afkxPv9b4CRaTwecqwHisRH7yMUPQvF).  This means that transaction had a transaction fee of exactly 0.00001 BTC.  That's a fee of just barely more than $0.01

Something you are saying just isn't adding up.  Either you are lying to try to spread FUD, or you are misunderstanding something you are seeing.

[emsi]

- snip -
it calculated the fee of over a 1BTC for it
- snip -
The rejected transactions are not very huge, the average looks like this:
- snip -

After a bit more investigation, I've found that this is demonstrably NOT TRUE.

The example transaction that you posted spends a total of 0.00063050 in inputs.  It would be IMPOSSSIBLE for that transaction to have a fee of 1 BTC.

The example transaction that you posted creates a total of 0.00062050 in new unspent outputs (0.0000878 to 1Dcu2y3eefKRVkJY7JSJeaouRyEnBYaWJt and 0.0005327 to 1N7afkxPv9b4CRaTwecqwHisRH7yMUPQvF).  This means that transaction had a transaction fee of exactly 0.00001 BTC.  That's a fee of just barely more than $0.01

Something you are saying just isn't adding up.  Either you are lying to try to spread FUD, or you are misunderstanding something you are seeing.

Probably the transaction I pasted was one of the smaller ones I tried (my bad).
Here is the output of a full amount transaction calculation:
https://content.screencast.com/users/emsi/folders/Jing/media/6f17cf34-2ec3-4acb-9b54-fb54f77c2d0a/2017-02-20_2028.png
Basically I'm not able to make it. The client is not even attempting to make an actual transaction as it finds it not feasible at all.

The wallet is a result of hundreds of transactions like this:
https://www.screencast.com/t/nd1ZHCS04HY (~500 x 0.001BTC)



When I try with a smaller transaction, like 0.009 with over 10% fee of 0.001 I end up with following  transaction being rejected:

Code:

Transaction:
   TxHash:    6e211d4377e6be2cab106c8e46c89510e5f68b9ba390afb242ea03f5a84b85b4 (BE)
   Version:   1
   nInputs:   5
   nOutputs:  2
   LockTime:  0
   Inputs: 
      PyTxIn:
         PrevTxHash: af419306f1dc87614eef95028e86fde839225a056395265eb6c3083058acd432 (BE)
         TxOutIndex: 73
         Script:     (493046022100a5a1d97eaeabc814219009c3e21bbde7b2d109c139309108e590)
         Sender:     1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
         Seq:        4294967295
      PyTxIn:
         PrevTxHash: 78c937c5c9ddb419d3bf518036405bacd3fdf862d5ca4aa9e406613fe6a431c2 (BE)
         TxOutIndex: 18
         Script:     (4830450220658166a3aa317f3474bcbdf98846423f02d2ea7c963b1392ab962c)
         Sender:     1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
         Seq:        4294967295
      PyTxIn:
         PrevTxHash: dd9da02bbb566681162f9956f6c2d6e47d2d0428098a2c0aba9ba4cb25ddc91e (BE)
         TxOutIndex: 74
         Script:     (493046022100b5f1085d9e2730cc003f740554eec2d1ddc0a94dbd74aeebf29d)
         Sender:     1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
         Seq:        4294967295
      PyTxIn:
         PrevTxHash: 49cb45f6e3e3dacf174c9e911691f30c01878a527ab9756b1a87d4113700b837 (BE)
         TxOutIndex: 47
         Script:     (48304502210082c199a6b385c3b20b42862dcd8a1cde03e885ea6f45995b7df7)
         Sender:     1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
         Seq:        4294967295
      PyTxIn:
         PrevTxHash: 62e2c9099dc95e8d16aa046ab5efa9b587aa68b55d5b35b875424559c7d6a98a (BE)
         TxOutIndex: 45
         Script:     (48304502203734cb9066f44077bed7d6a7ff41c36b67ae8709c7da937f93df7d)
         Sender:     1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
         Seq:        4294967295
   Outputs: 
      TxOut:
         Value:   90000 (0.0009)
         Script:  OP_DUP OP_HASH160 (1FfzoU7AX3Yqx4bt7kw4xVEn8tyRrrs7sq) OP_EQUALVERIFY OP_CHECKSIG
      TxOut:
         Value:   22476 (0.00022476)
         Script:  OP_DUP OP_HASH160 (17v9P7EFfHjWCCug711x3sGZqkZz6Mz4KT) OP_EQUALVERIFY OP_CHECKSIG

[achow101]

Probably the transaction I pasted was one of the smaller ones I tried (my bad).
Here is the output of a full amount transaction calculation:

Basically I'm not able to make it. The client is not even attempting to make an actual transaction as it finds it not feasible at all.

Again, what version of Armory are you using? The reason the transaction is not being made is because it calculates the fee to be too large for the amount of your transaction so that transaction would be invalid. IIRC if you are using the "Expert" usermode, you can force it to use the smaller fee.

Also, it doesn't say the fee is 1 BTC but rather 0.1. It also looks like you are attempting to spend all of the Bitcoin from your a-ads payments, and that appears to be in the thousands of inputs to consume, so your transaction is going to be very very large.

The wallet is a result of hundreds of transactions like this:
https://www.screencast.com/t/nd1ZHCS04HY (~500 x 0.001BTC)

You should change your a-ads payout threshold to be a lot higher to avoid this problem.

[LoyceV]

The wallet is a result of hundreds of transactions like this:
https://www.screencast.com/t/nd1ZHCS04HY (~500 x 0.001BTC)

Let me visualize it. This is you:

If you want to pay with this, counting the coins is expensive.

Not so long ago you could consolidate small inputs by adding them to a larger input, old enough to have "Medium" priority on it's own, not exceeding 1000 bytes per transaction. That way you could consolidate 5 each time, even without fee.
Nowadays, zero fee transactions barely get confirmed. It might still work once in a while, but most of the time you'll need to pay more fee anyway, and making hundreds of transactions is a lot of work.

Maybe you can just keep the dust in the current wallet for a few years? Who knows, in the future fees might get lower again, or 10k satoshi may be worth something at some point.

[DannyHamilton]

The wallet is a result of hundreds of transactions like this:
https://www.screencast.com/t/nd1ZHCS04HY (~500 x 0.001BTC)

You keep saying things that aren't true.

If your wallet balance was a result of 500 payments of 0.001 BTC, then your wallet balance would be:
500 X 0.001 = 0.5 BTC

The picture you linked to shows a wallet with a balance of 0.05337027

I suspect that you either have less unspent outputs than you think you do, or the average value of the unspent outputs is closer to 0.0001 BTC than 0.001 BTC.

Of those two possibilities, I suspect that the average output value is more like 0.0001 BTC.

Accepting payments of 0.0001 BTC was a VERY bad idea on your part.
Each of those outputs are going to add about 148 bytes to any transaction you try to send.
At the current cost of about 0.00000180 BTC per byte, that means that each of those 0.0001 BTC payments will cost you about 0.00026640 BTC to spend.

In other words...

Every one of those payments that you received were essentially worthless.  The site that sent them to you probably knew they were sending you worthless amounts, but they didn't care. They were still getting their profits from advertising revenue.  Effectively, you've been scammed.

At best, you can hope that the value of bitcoins gets high enough and the costs per transaction gets low enough in the future so that these outputs gain some worth.

[achow101]

You keep saying things that aren't true.

If your wallet balance was a result of 500 payments of 0.001 BTC, then your wallet balance would be:
500 X 0.001 = 0.5 BTC

The picture you linked to shows a wallet with a balance of 0.05337027

I suspect that you either have less unspent outputs than you think you do, or the average value of the unspent outputs is closer to 0.0001 BTC than 0.001 BTC.

Of those two possibilities, I suspect that the average output value is more like 0.0001 BTC.

His second image shows that he's getting outputs of 0.0001 BTC.

Accepting payments of 0.0001 BTC was a VERY bad idea on your part.
Each of those outputs are going to add about 148 bytes to any transaction you try to send.
At the current cost of about 0.00000180 BTC per byte, that means that each of those 0.0001 BTC payments will cost you about 0.00026640 BTC to spend.

The inputs are actually 180 bytes because he is using Armory (and probably an old version of Armory) which still uses uncompressed keys (technical debt due to lack of development for a while. Compressed keys will be supported soon^TM)

According to http://bitcoinfees.21.co/ the current recommended fee is actually 0.00000140 BTC/byte so each additional input will cost 0.00025200 BTC, still more than the value of each output.

[DannyHamilton]

- snip -
he's getting outputs of 0.0001 BTC.

I figured that was probably the case.

- snip -
The inputs are actually 180 bytes because he is using Armory

That's right.  I forgot that uncompressed key addresses are actually 180 bytes per input.

It was a very bad idea to be cashing out at 0.0001 BTC in the first place.  Even worse of an idea to do that into an Armory address.

According to http://bitcoinfees.21.co/ the current recommended fee is actually 0.00000140 BTC/byte so each additional input will cost 0.00025200 BTC, still more than the value of each output.

Yep.  Fees change over time depending on how much demand there is for block space.  It was 0.00000180 BTC / byte when I entered this conversation.  Good to see that it has dropped to  0.00000140 BTC / byte, but it needs to drop significantly below 0.00000070 BTC / byte for any of these outputs to be useful.

[LoyceV]

According to http://bitcoinfees.21.co/ the current recommended fee is actually 0.00000140 BTC/byte so each additional input will cost 0.00025200 BTC, still more than the value of each output.

That "recommended" fee is only meant to be the lowest possible fee for a very fast confirmation. In this case it's a bad recommendation, emsi has been collecting dust for a long time and I see no reason why he'd be in a rush now.
What he could do, is make 10 sat/byte payments, that gives about 6 inputs in 1 kB, so he pays 1 input to collect 5 inputs. Then, copy the transaction (txid) into https://www.viabtc.com/tools/txaccelerator/ to get it confirmed. This way emsi gets to keep about 80% of his 0.05 BTC.

[emsi]

Every one of those payments that you received were essentially worthless.  The site that sent them to you probably knew they were sending you worthless amounts, but they didn't care. They were still getting their profits from advertising revenue.  Effectively, you've been scammed.

They were not in 2013. The payments were coming till October last year or so. I managed to move some at lest in 2015.
It's not a big loss for me but having any money that is unspendable yet perfectly legit means the currency is broken. (And it looks like 0.0001BTC is not a "legal tender" any more which happened without any announcement).
It's 0.0001 today and might be 0.01 in a year (just depends on what miners will find profitable at that time). Just wonder what happens when there is no more new coins to dig. The commission will be the sole source of profit... unless the miners will hardfork bitcoin into an ever lasting source of new bitcoins or whatever. That means Bitcoin is broken beyond repair no matter how you will ridicule people with small coins (I remember the days of bitcoin faucet sending such coins for free).

p.s. yes, i mistyped one 0, the screenshots were correct though.

p.s.: This is the the address with the dust: https://blockchain.info/address/1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX... and I can tell there's more addresses with such small coins:
https://blockchain.info/related_tags?active=1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX
I remember when I was reading about bitcoin a dacade ago or so it was meant to be perfectly suited for micropayments... now it's turned into micro-pain-ments

[sxafir]

I also have problem with send Btc from my wallet.

We can't help you if that is all you say, please explain in more detail.

Electrum wallet i have download is not working.Says code mempoll and this is about fee which i have default.Downloaded lasted version , install and steal have the same problem.Actually using another wallet and ok.No problem.

[LoyceV]

p.s.: This is the the address with the dust: https://blockchain.info/address/1AsPzC53491jKTvwrUEZnvF6cgtXDWD8mX...

Now would be a good time to try again!
Although https://bitcoinfees.21.co/ recommends 140 satoshi/byte, https://btc.com/stats/unconfirmed-tx recommends only 20 satoshi/byte. And this is for an almost instant transaction, so you can go lower. With currently only 3000 unconfirmed transactions there isn't much competition and you have a good chance you can consolidate many small inputs today.

Use these rare moments to exchange dust if you have had many small incoming transactions in the past!

[Nathan047]

I was just asking around here about this. While high fees don't "break" bitcoin it probably will hurt adoption and I think that'd be enough to get some attention (although I'm not sure the community could come to an agreement on a solution).

[veleten]

You can try your luck and make a transaction with low fee, but looking at the network right now it will be dropped, just wait until sometime when the network isn't congested.

This morning was ideal for such transaction, there were very few transactions waiting.

I tried this morning. Last Friday the fee for sending out 0.05 was over 1BTC, this morning it was like 0.1, still twice the amount to send!
Even it were ten times lower (which seems it is not going to happen ever again) a puny 0.01 it'd be a 20% which still is ridiculous.

why don't you just sweep your private keys into a different wallet and try to resend?
as achow pointed out above,you must be having a glitch in your wallet software
afaik armory allows export of the private keys through -"Backup This Wallet" - option "Export Key Lists" (must have adveanced options on)

this will show you your addresses and corresponding private keys
then download Electrum or use any other wallet that supports private keys import
with Electrum you should paste your keys into  Sweep Private Keys box

and then try to send your transaction again,it should not cost over 0.001 bitcoins

[shorena]

-snip-
why don't you just sweep your private keys into a different wallet and try to resend?

Because the issue is unrelated to the wallet, thus sweeping will not work (as it creates a TX) and neither will importing (you will have the same problem). I think the only way to still use these coins is to spend them with larger inputs, according to my estimates it will still result in an overall loss of coins unless the network fee gets significantly lower (~half)[1!]. I played with the idea of buying OPs private keys and just doing it myself.[2]

as achow pointed out above,you must be having a glitch in your wallet software
afaik armory allows export of the private keys through -"Backup This Wallet" - option "Export Key Lists" (must have adveanced options on)

this will show you your addresses and corresponding private keys
then download Electrum or use any other wallet that supports private keys import
with Electrum you should paste your keys into  Sweep Private Keys box

and then try to send your transaction again,it should not cost over 0.001 bitcoins

500 inputs worth 0.0001 each currently cost more than 0.005 to spend. Cointape right now suggests 180 satoshi per byte for a timely confirmation. Each input weights 180 bytes and is worth 0.0001, thus the fee needed to spend each input is 3 times as high as the inputs value.

tl;dr: 180*180/10^8 > 0.0001

[1] apparently it increased since my last calculation, see below for the second part.
[2] @emsi feel free to contact me via PM about this.