What block size will be needed to support LN transactions at Visa volumes?

[JFC]

According to https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Scalability "VISA handles on average around 2,000 transactions per second (tps), so call it a daily peak rate of 4,000 tps. It has a peak capacity of around 56,000 transactions per second".

Supposing SegWit is operational, and all the OP_CODES needed for a full implementation of Lightning Network are also operational, what would be a good estimate for how large a block has to be in order to support as many transactions as Visa?

More specifically: What kind of transactions would have to happen obligatorily in the blockchain? Monthly salary payments to fund the channel, for instance? What else?

What about VISA + all other major credit cards combined + 90% of cash payments world wide?

Bonus question: If the block size required for all of these becomes too large to become desirable, what is the next trick we can use in addition of LN? Sidechains?

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[moonpie45]

I do not think your question is relevant to Bitcoin at the current time. Bitcoin is nowhere near the size of VISA, and will all but certainly not reach VISA scale anytime in the near future.

The number of transactions that Bitcoin handles will grow (hoepefully) over time, and will not reach 44k per second simply because the capacity has been built.

The technology available to the general public will exponentially improve over time, which will allow for higher transaction throughput using the same financial resources.

Bonus point: even though VISA has handled 46k+ transactions per second in the past, they would probably not be able to handle this many transactions in the middle of March 2017 without notice of a spike in transactions from the level transactions are otherwise expected to be at

[stdset]

More specifically: What kind of transactions would have to happen obligatorily in the blockchain? Monthly salary payments to fund the channel, for instance? What else?

That doesn't have to happen onchain. Nothing prevents salary payments from happening over LN.

[JFC]

More specifically: What kind of transactions would have to happen obligatorily in the blockchain? Monthly salary payments to fund the channel, for instance? What else?

That doesn't have to happen onchain. Nothing prevents salary payments from happening over LN.

Hi,

I must be missing something here.
Imagine we are living in LN Land in the near future and then a somewhat typical scenario (give or take a few bitcoins)...

Adam is a good web designer and earns 10 BTC every month.
He lives with mom and dad and he is a thrifty guy, so he only spends 3 BTC each month and saves the rest.

Let's say he receives and spends all of his money over the LN. He routes all of this money transfers through LN-Pay, a popular bitcoin routing services company.

If he is receiving 10 BTC every month and he only sends back 3 BTC, so he is accumulating 7 BTC/month.

Won't that quickly deplete any reasonable funding transaction that LN-Pay was willing to fund when he became a client?

[stdset]

Hi,

I must be missing something here.
Imagine we are living in LN Land in the near future and then a somewhat typical scenario (give or take a few bitcoins)...

Adam is a good web designer and earns 10 BTC every month.
He lives with mom and dad and he is a thrifty guy, so he only spends 3 BTC each month and saves the rest.

Let's say he receives and spends all of his money over the LN. He routes all of this money transfers through LN-Pay, a popular bitcoin routing services company.

If he is receiving 10 BTC every month and he only sends back 3 BTC, so he is accumulating 7 BTC/month.

Won't that quickly deplete any reasonable funding transaction that LN-Pay was willing to fund when he became a client?

Sure, such user will need to open new channels quite often. But another, more regular, user who spends and earns more or less the same amount, will be able to use one channel much longer.

[JFC]

Sure, such user will need to open new channels quite often. But another, more regular, user who spends and earns more or less the same amount, will be able to use one channel much longer.

Most of the people I know tend to save some money every month (if not so dramatically), so I am afraid that's the typical case. And one can envision many more similar cases where the funding transaction is depleted.

A successful implementation of LN will surely place a much greater pressure on the blockchain even if a quite large portion of the transactions happen off-chain, so I am afraid the scalability problem of bitcoin still needs some more answers. Anyway, LN is an incredibly exciting technology with so much potential. No wonder the price of bitcoin is trending upwards with the news of SegWit and LN approaching.