The mathematical theory of payment channel networks may help address these issues.
Discussion
To mitigate infeasible payments on-chain transactions are needed.
Making a payment is equivalent to changing the wealth vector in a wealth distribution.
Liquidity issue:
Channels tend to deplete even in a circular economy. According to simulations, fees can only weakly predict depletion side of a channel.
You cannot look at the problem as local, only globally.
Maximizing the fee potential seems a way to clearly predict which state are more likely to show depleted channels.
Node operators could run a collaborative channel replenishment protocol to rebalance depleted channels in a collaborative manner, according to recent research.
Key takeways:
- Difference between uncertainty of liquidity and unfeasibility of payments
- off-chain rebalancing does not change unfeasibility
- Payment and on-chain txs change it
- Multi-party channels increase degree of freedom of the liquidity