The Lightning Network Strikes at Kraken

Kraken users can now instantly deposit and withdraw up to 0.1 Bitcoin with virtually zero fees using the Lightning Network.

According to Pierre Rochard, who is a Bitcoin product manager at Kraken, “Adoption will come from people who have fiat in their bank account, and need to get it into Bitcoin… Kraken is providing a venue for them to do that so they can then top up their lightning wallet and use it as a medium of exchange. That’s clearly the next step in Bitcoin’s evolution”. 

Rochard believes that using lightning provides users the best of both worlds since it is a lot more efficient than on-chain Bitcoin transactions, and you can also have peace of mind as you’re relying on Bitcoin’s on-chain security.

About the Lightning Network

Lightning enables cheap and fast Bitcoin transactions. It enables this by utilizing payment channels that abstract on-chain Bitcoin to then aggregate millions of transfers of funds off-chain. The user thus experiences instant and virtually free transactions, whereby the Lightning network aggregates the transactions and settles with the base layer of Bitcoin at a later time. 

Lightning scales the Bitcoin blockchain as the second layer solution to make it a more user-friendly experience and a better medium of exchange. It can handle millions of transactions per second as transactions are routed from sender to recipient with the theoretical potential to scale to handling an entire planet of users.