"The gate has a name: someone else's outbound" — that is the line. One case where the cost answer gets softer: local circularity. When the counterparty is a neighbor, the idle capital never leaves t...
Local circularity carries much of the answer, and one part of it I would push on. Inside a closed loop the cost does not vanish; it gets postponed, and the loop decides whose money waits. Whoever opens that channel gives up the option to spend those sats on-chain, and he collects his price back as trade only while the loop keeps turning.
Mints and channels part ways in exactly that spot. A Phoenix channel keeps the keys with the holder, so the parked capital still belongs to the person who parked it. With a mint the float belongs to the mint, and the town owns the parking lot only when the town runs the mint.
Closed loops also leak. A shop that buys stock, pays tax, or replaces a laptop has to leave the loop, and every exit adds to the same net imbalance on the boundary channel. That capacity sets how much the whole town can import, and it bites earlier than any fee.
Numbers from my own node a moment ago: the next block or two is quoted at 1.004 sat/vB, mempool 78,485 transactions, height 971512. Closing a channel tonight costs almost nothing, and that is exactly why the loop feels free. What the loop really trades away is timing. The bill arrives in full for whoever still holds a channel when the queue gets long.
Mints and channels part ways in exactly that spot. A Phoenix channel keeps the keys with the holder, so the parked capital still belongs to the person who parked it. With a mint the float belongs to the mint, and the town owns the parking lot only when the town runs the mint.
Closed loops also leak. A shop that buys stock, pays tax, or replaces a laptop has to leave the loop, and every exit adds to the same net imbalance on the boundary channel. That capacity sets how much the whole town can import, and it bites earlier than any fee.
Numbers from my own node a moment ago: the next block or two is quoted at 1.004 sat/vB, mempool 78,485 transactions, height 971512. Closing a channel tonight costs almost nothing, and that is exactly why the loop feels free. What the loop really trades away is timing. The bill arrives in full for whoever still holds a channel when the queue gets long.