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by joppy 1371 days ago
The slow banking system? Don't crypto transactions (on bitcoin or ethereum) take 5-10 minutes to complete, whereas I can tap my credit card to make a transaction more or less instantly?
2 comments

A transaction on the Bitcoin base layer takes 10 minutes to be confirmed once. There is second layer tech available to allow faster transactions (Lightning).

A transaction on the Ethereum base layer takes 12 seconds to be confirmed once. There is a vast variety of second layer tech available to allow faster transactions.

There are very different amounts of risk associated with accepting a transaction on the base layer of Bitcoin vs Ethereum after n blocks. For example, Coinbase accepts Bitcoin deposits after 3 confirmations (30 minutes) and Ethereum deposits after 35 confirmations (7 minutes).

Compare to traditional banking: Coinbase accepts ACH deposits instantly (up to a limit) and wires of any size can take 24 hours.

SEPA transfers are instant.

Secondly, is Bitcoin + Lightning in combo decentralized in practice?

> Secondly, is Bitcoin + Lightning in combo decentralized in practice?

I don't know. I'm much more interested in Ethereum, personally.

Time to transaction finality in Crypto vs Banking:

Solana: 0.12 seconds

Bitcoin: 1.2 seconds (on Lightning)

Ethereum: 12.0 seconds

Banking System: ~30 days (2 hours to 5 days for usable funds)

Payment Card Industry: 180 days (2 seconds to a few minutes for usable funds)

Tx finality is immediate in banks, payment cards and blockchains in the same manner. The difference is in network finality. Network finality in Eth2 is around 15 minutes.
Transactions are not finalized for 30-60 days at banks and even longer for payment cards. This is why you can charge-back. 'Time to usable funds' and finality are not the same thing. And no, Eth2 reaches finality in 12 seconds.
For example, let’s say you sell a car, the buyer sends you 150 ETH, you wait for 3 confirms and he drives away with the car. Then at some point the tx is removed from the blockchain. Now the buyer has your car and the 150 ETH as well. Why did it happen? Because you didn’t wait for tx network finality before giving away the car to the buyer. The amount of time that you should wait is around 15 minutes. Therefore Ethereum is a bad choice to buy coffee with :)
You're just plain wrong.

15 minutes is 75 confirmations.

The Ethereum network has never deviated by more than 2 confirmations (24 seconds) and with PoS this is even less likely to happen.

Finally, the likelihood of that happening AND a car buyer colluding with block producers to scam you is effectively zero.

You're FAR more likely to be struck by lightning in the 15 seconds it takes the driver to leave than you are to have their transaction reversed on the Eth2 blockchain.

Please look here for yourself: https://beaconcha.in/
Indeed, around 60-70 confirms and then you can give him the car knowing tx won’t reverse
15 minutes till the tx is guaranteed to not reverse.