Key Notes
- Lightning Network’s capacity reached over 5,600 BTC in December, up from 4,200 BTC earlier in 2025, signaling growing infrastructure strength.
- The protocol now processes roughly 15% of merchant Bitcoin payments, nearly double the 2023 rate, with major exchanges adding liquidity.
- SDM’s million-dollar pilot demonstrates Lightning’s potential shift from micropayments to institutional settlement infrastructure for high-value transfers.
Secure Digital Markets sent $1 million to Kraken over Bitcoin’s Lightning Network on January 28, 2026, settling the transaction almost instantly with minimal fees—the first publicly disclosed seven-figure payment on the protocol.
Lightning Network was built to handle small, everyday transactions, usually under $100. The protocol works as a second layer on top of Bitcoin
BTC
$70 175
24h volatility:
6.7%
Market cap:
$1.40 T
Vol. 24h:
$97.82 B
blockchain, using pre-funded payment channels to speed up transfers and cut costs compared to sluggish on-chain settlements. This layer was designed before 2017, and it’s under constant test to know its limits.
But this new pilot with Kraken shows it can handle institutional-sized payments, too, thanks to Voltage’s managed node infrastructure, which offers the uptime and liquidity guarantees big players need, according to the announcement.
Mostafa Al-Mashita, who co-founded SDM and runs sales and trading there, framed the test as a turning point. “Moving $1 million to Kraken over the Lightning Network marks a definitive shift in the architecture of global settlement,” he said. “We have moved past the era of questioning Bitcoin’s institutional capacity. Now, the only remaining variable is how quickly lagging institutions will abandon legacy systems.”
Lightning Network Capacity and Usage Show Growth
Lightning’s total capacity hit an all-time high of over 5,600 BTC last December, up from around 4,200 BTC earlier in 2025, according to data from Bitcoin Visuals. The network currently operates with approximately 17,300 nodes and 40,900 active channels, according to mempool space data, down from peak node counts in previous years but with consolidated, higher-capacity channels.
Graph of Lightning Network capacity over time | Source: Bitcoin Visuals
This conduct appears to be related to merchant adoption acceleration over the last few years. Lightning now handles roughly 15% of Bitcoin payments for merchants, nearly double the rate from 2023, according to Coinlaw report. Major exchanges like Binance added substantial liquidity to their Lightning channels, driving much of the capacity growth. Even the big merchant payments company, like Square, enabled its use at the end of 2025.
One infrastructure provider, LQWD Technologies, reported routing over 2,012 BTC across 2 million transactions by December, with daily volumes reaching 7,500.
If SDM’s pilot signals broader institutional interest, Lightning could shift from a micropayment tool to a legitimate settlement network for high-value transfers. The infrastructure appears ready; the question is whether traditional finance will follow these innovations.
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José Rafael Peña Gholam is a cryptocurrency journalist and editor with 9 years of experience in the industry. He wrote at top outlets like CriptoNoticias, BeInCrypto, and CoinDesk. Specializing in Bitcoin, blockchain, and Web3, he creates news, analysis, and educational content for global audiences in both Spanish and English.