CNBC tested out an international transfer of cash with a Ukrainian staying in Poland via bitcoin’s Lightning Network.
to Dallas, Peter McCormack — founder and host of the popular What Bitcoin Did' podcast — taught CNBC how to use the Lightning Network to make instant payments to anyone in the world.
On a three-way video call with Naumenko in Western Ukraine, Vorobiova in Southwest Poland, and CNBC in Miami, we followed a very similar sequence of events. "A Lightning wallet app is akin to a bank, in that sending money between banks requires them to speak the same language," said Czyz, a developer with Jack Dorsey's team known as Spiral . That common language is the BOLT specification.
She accomplished this by using a QR code that the ATM spit out. She scanned the QR code into her phone using the Muun app, transferred her bitcoin into the ATM's account, and the ATM in turn issued the money. She ended up with 170 zloty, the Polish currency, worth about 100,000 sats or $40. The ATM company took a fee of 10 zloty, or about 5.5% of the total transaction.For Vorobiova, this was more of a fun experiment.