>The banks have established, high quality, insured, and regulated ways of handling ACH (you can even do it on your mobile).
The main problem is speed. The fact that it takes two days, sometimes more, for a few bits in a few computers to flip, in 2012, is absurd, regardless of how many fraud checking algorithms you have to run it through.
The fact that you'd call the mass transfer of funds from 10,000 plus parties to a single source 'a few bits flipping' shows you have no idea how ACH payments work. There are multiple checkpoints, several systems, including the eMoney/FED that these payments need to pass through.
You also need to deal with the actual transition of funds (which are NOT BITS). You forget, you are moving real currency here which needs to be accounted for and balanced between the parties.
While I agree it's a misnomer to summarize ACH as trivial (NACHA's Operating Rules & Guidelines are mind-numbing), a far-reaching near-real-time payment platform isn't impossible. Establishing such a network is obstructed by bureaucracy, not technology.
Comments
>The banks have established, high quality, insured, and regulated ways of handling ACH (you can even do it on your mobile).
The main problem is speed. The fact that it takes two days, sometimes more, for a few bits in a few computers to flip, in 2012, is absurd, regardless of how many fraud checking algorithms you have to run it through.
The fact that you'd call the mass transfer of funds from 10,000 plus parties to a single source 'a few bits flipping' shows you have no idea how ACH payments work. There are multiple checkpoints, several systems, including the eMoney/FED that these payments need to pass through.
You also need to deal with the actual transition of funds (which are NOT BITS). You forget, you are moving real currency here which needs to be accounted for and balanced between the parties.
While I agree it's a misnomer to summarize ACH as trivial (NACHA's Operating Rules & Guidelines are mind-numbing), a far-reaching near-real-time payment platform isn't impossible. Establishing such a network is obstructed by bureaucracy, not technology.
Wait, we actually move money in the US nowadays?
I figured the big banks just had stacks of gold and cash in a central vault and moved it around cells every quarter.
Why shouldn't a fiat currency be bits?