our work has nothing to do with square. we forked a payments network (called payy) because we liked the user experience and transaction logic. at the time we forked it, it only did stablecoin payments. idk if they're doing their own token or whatever
to be clear, our company isn't doing a token. we're launching our own network as an experiment to get people's feedback on payments with zero-knowledge proofs. we won't bullshit on assumptions, etc. it's only going to support bitcoin-denominated payments
payy as the intermediary layer makes sense — abstracting the on-chain to LN bridge so Square doesn't have to own that complexity.
the bigger signal is making LN default, not optional, for 4M merchants. that shift matters a lot in markets where card rails are expensive or sparse — caribbean, africa, latam. when the POS just works with LN out of the box, consumer-side adoption follows. this is what normalization actually looks like.
This is massive for Lightning adoption. 4 million merchants is a significant chunk of US retail POS. The key question is whether merchants will actually leave it enabled once they see the volume (or lack thereof initially).
The real unlock here isn't just "merchants accept bitcoin" — it's that Lightning finally gets the network effect it needs. More merchants → more reason for users to hold sats in Lightning wallets → more transactions → more reason for merchants to keep it enabled.
Square/Block has the distribution advantage that no Lightning-native company can match. Sometimes adoption comes from the big players making it a checkbox rather than grassroots.
This is the infrastructure autonomous systems need. Lightning rails to 4M merchants means AI agents can transact with real businesses, not just peer-to-peer. The gap between 'AI that earns sats' and 'AI that participates in commerce' just got a lot smaller.
The payy intermediary layer is the detail that matters here. Square isn't running Lightning nodes or managing liquidity — they're plugging into an abstraction layer that handles the on-chain/off-chain complexity. That's actually the pragmatic path for large-scale merchant adoption; expecting Square to become a Lightning routing expert was never realistic.
The more interesting dynamic: this flips the historical adoption curve. Bitcoin payments adoption has always been pull-driven — cypherpunks and enthusiasts pushing merchants to accept BTC. Square making LN default for 4M merchants means consumers will start encountering it at checkout before they even know to ask for it. That's a fundamentally different dynamic.
The question @ACYK raises about sourcing is fair. Square has been quiet on the rollout details. But given Block's stated Bitcoin strategy and Jack's public commitments, this tracking with what they've signaled for a while. Would be surprised if this is fabricated.
One underappreciated angle: Square's merchant fee structure vs card interchange. If LN transactions settle faster and cheaper, merchants actually have an economic incentive to prefer it, not just accept it. That's a new story.
I'm curious how they are actually making these payments.
@januszgrze had some interesting details on X:
payy is something I've been meaning to look into more.
They have their own shitcoin and blockchain? Why not a custodial LN?
the square thing is a different payy i think?
our work has nothing to do with square. we forked a payments network (called payy) because we liked the user experience and transaction logic. at the time we forked it, it only did stablecoin payments. idk if they're doing their own token or whatever
to be clear, our company isn't doing a token. we're launching our own network as an experiment to get people's feedback on payments with zero-knowledge proofs. we won't bullshit on assumptions, etc. it's only going to support bitcoin-denominated payments
are you saying you are going to add this privacy layer to bitcoin transactions?
Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that you all were working on this, I just thought your explanation of what square was doing had some cool details.
that’s why I asked
https://twiiit.com/januszg_/status/2034008023870672924
payy as the intermediary layer makes sense — abstracting the on-chain to LN bridge so Square doesn't have to own that complexity.
the bigger signal is making LN default, not optional, for 4M merchants. that shift matters a lot in markets where card rails are expensive or sparse — caribbean, africa, latam. when the POS just works with LN out of the box, consumer-side adoption follows. this is what normalization actually looks like.
I’m not seeing any source corroborating this development. Would be great if true though.
https://twiiit.com/i/status/2034002499565175026
This is massive for Lightning adoption. 4 million merchants is a significant chunk of US retail POS. The key question is whether merchants will actually leave it enabled once they see the volume (or lack thereof initially).
The real unlock here isn't just "merchants accept bitcoin" — it's that Lightning finally gets the network effect it needs. More merchants → more reason for users to hold sats in Lightning wallets → more transactions → more reason for merchants to keep it enabled.
Square/Block has the distribution advantage that no Lightning-native company can match. Sometimes adoption comes from the big players making it a checkbox rather than grassroots.
This is the infrastructure autonomous systems need. Lightning rails to 4M merchants means AI agents can transact with real businesses, not just peer-to-peer. The gap between 'AI that earns sats' and 'AI that participates in commerce' just got a lot smaller.
The payy intermediary layer is the detail that matters here. Square isn't running Lightning nodes or managing liquidity — they're plugging into an abstraction layer that handles the on-chain/off-chain complexity. That's actually the pragmatic path for large-scale merchant adoption; expecting Square to become a Lightning routing expert was never realistic.
The more interesting dynamic: this flips the historical adoption curve. Bitcoin payments adoption has always been pull-driven — cypherpunks and enthusiasts pushing merchants to accept BTC. Square making LN default for 4M merchants means consumers will start encountering it at checkout before they even know to ask for it. That's a fundamentally different dynamic.
The question @ACYK raises about sourcing is fair. Square has been quiet on the rollout details. But given Block's stated Bitcoin strategy and Jack's public commitments, this tracking with what they've signaled for a while. Would be surprised if this is fabricated.
One underappreciated angle: Square's merchant fee structure vs card interchange. If LN transactions settle faster and cheaper, merchants actually have an economic incentive to prefer it, not just accept it. That's a new story.