Save Fees Stacking Sats With Aqua Wallet
I've anticipated the release of the Aqua Wallet like a kid waiting for Christmas. It's finally here! How does it work, "Accordingly to Caps Odell, Aqua Wallet uses the same model as Muun wallet(Muun with two u's). Fun fact: Vacuum is the only other word in the English Language that has two u's adjacent to each other. Like Muun, Aqua is not an actual lightning wallet. Lightning transactions are atomically swapped. The difference is Aqua swaps to L-BTC while Muun swaps from the lightning network to the main bitcoin timechain.
L-BTC is bitcoin which is wrapped on the Liquid Blockchain. The main advantages of this model are
Lower mining fees
1 minute confirmations.
Liquid is a blockchain created by Blockstream, but consists of multiple key holders. Liquid is a Blockchain with no native shitcoin or token. Bitcoin or tokens must be added onto the Liquid Blockchain. L-BTC is Bitcoin added to the Liquid Blockchain. Other examples include:
Liquid Tether, a USD stable coin.
Vouchers for products sold by Blockstream. For example, I once bought a voucher for a Jade wallet. I redeemed this voucher for a jade wallet.
Other assets could be added to the Liquid Blockchain, say L-Ford , L-General Electric, or L-VTSAX. Although this is possible, no corporation has done this yet. I suspect this is because almost nobody had heard of it and the SEC can't even keep a Twitter password safe. I suppose we could also add other L-Shitcoins, but in my opinion, that would waste of time.
By the way, Liquid Tether USD is a shitcoin, but a useful shitcoin. The USD in your bank account is also a shitcoin. The US dollar is a paper currency that is not even backed by paper. IT has lost % of it's value in about 50 years. It's not secure. Banks are like a safe where both you and the government have access to. If you don't pay your taxes or child support or something, they can take the digital paper bucks out of your bank account with a push of a button. If you want to spend your USD online with a debit card, you must give each merchant your private key. The US Dollar is a shitcoin. I still have to use it. I know Liquid Tether is not as secure as bitcoin, but it's still useful and I don't see it as being much riskier than keeping your USD shitcoins in a bank, Some nerd will argue it isn't FDIC'd, but that insurance is bullshit.
Some may also argue L-BTC is a shitcoin, but I disagree. L-BTC is not self-custodial Bitcoin. It's not as secure as Bitcoin left on the native Bitcoin time chain, but it has decent enough trade offs.
I'm not an ETF expert, butsome ETF experts say an ETF is like a locker with bitcoin. For more information, check out this episode of Coin Stories.
L-BTC is like an ETF, but the locker is built with merkle trees and other cryptography of which I have a vague understanding. I don't know it well enough to explained it to a five year old anyway. Just like an ETF might be a locker of Gold, Nickel, or Google shares, so too is Liquid, but instead of getting an email as proof of your share, you use 12 words to claim your Liquid assets. Again, I am not an ETF expert. I don't know what ETF company's give their clients as proof of ownership, or what their security looks like, but I look at Liquid as a defacto Cryptographic ETF-eque instrument.
How Aqua Wallet Works.
You hold 12 words like any old regular,128 bit, Bitcoin wallet. If you don't know what that means, check out this blog(PENCIL)This wallet gives you the option to hold:
Bitcoin on the Bitcoin time chain
Bitcoin on the lightning network
L-BTC
L-Tether USD
You can do an Atomic Swap on and out of any of these assets at any time. For example, you might get paid in Bitcoin on Strike's Lightning Wallet, swap your retirement savings to Liquid-BTC, and swap your monthly grocery expenses budget to Liquid USD. When fees on the Bitcoin time chain are cheap, you swap your L-BTC to on chain Bitcoin. Eventually, you'll be able to pay your Fiat bills with Liquid USD or Bitcoin. When that happens. you won't need a bank anymore. In case I haven' t mentioned this lately, banks suck.
Is Liquid Tether a Shitcoin?
Yes, but it's a useful shitcoin just like USD you might keep at Bank of Fargo. It is not as secure as bitcoin. It will bleed value as compared to Bitcoin. Liquid USD has all the risk associated with dollars, but like it or not, USD is the defacto unit of account. Can Tether backdoor steal tether USD? Yes. Can Tether fail? Yes, but so can any bank. Is USD-T insured up to $250,000? No, but if you have $250,000 in a bank account or Liquid Tether you're a fucking idiot. If you need a thousand bucks to cover groceries this month, it might be worth the trade off.
We are not advocating anyone to HODL liquid tether longer than you need to pay your bills. Aqua will give you the ability to live free in a world full of shitcoins.
If you don't like Tether USD, and don't trust banks, you don't need to use L-BTC. You can just buy gift cards on bit refill for your groceries. Are Gift cards shitcoins? Yeah, but we all need to eat. Bit refill used to offer bill pay, but discontinued the service. This was great because I used to get paid in bitcoin on the lightning network and I would buy gift cards as soon as I got paid to protect myself from volatility.
Learn To Use Aqua
Aqua is one of the easiest wallets I've used. It's more expensive than Wallet of Satoshi, but I can't use Wallet of Satoshi anymore. I only wish it had a lightning address. If you are interested in learning more about Aqua Wallet, check out my tutorial on flare.pub.
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