Tip of the day

Alternative to LNDHUB accounts: Hosted Channels (HC) with Cliche + Poncho + SBW

Disclaimer: I do not want to shill SBW or cliche or any other LN solution, all my tips are based on my regular testing and learning about LN solutions and just want to give some hints to users that don't know about their existence.
Use case scenarios:
  • you want to offer services as "LN bank" to friends and/or family
  • you want to offer "commercial services" with HC to public users
  • you want to use HC for personal use with your own node
You have your own home node? Great, install Poncho onto your CLN node machine and start offering HC. All clients of your HC can use your node as LSP. Also can use multiple HCs and SBW having by default MPP, all payments will be routed through multiple HCs. This could improve a lot the traffic on LN and also add a certain level of privacy.
If you offer to your friends and family, in a private mode, they just have to scan your node QR address in SBW and add the HC provided. You can set the amount of the HC as you wish. You can set also the fees between them and with other destinations. This works the same as LNTXBOT.
If you offer HC to public users, you will need to be aware of the liquidity you have available, but also you can earn more sats from selling and routing using these HCs to the public. Many normal users, that do not have options to run their own nodes, will want to use SBW with HCs.
If you use HCs for yourself, also is a good way to use your own node in a more private way, adding an extra step/hop in your private txs. You can set private HC for yourself with any amount you want from your own Poncho server and in this way you will never reveal all the balance you have in your node. Having also multiple HCs in your SBW with other providers all activate a nice MPP route that will help your wallet to not have payment failures.
Enjoy! Think about this alternative.