I agree with SomeStupidPoint that at the current speeds it blows away both ACH and wire transfers if you need the transfer to happen pretty quickly but don't want to pay usurious fees.

Every major blockchain is trying to shard or find other solutions to increase scalability of confirmations. Most coins have it on the 2018 roadmap to deliver lots of these improvements which will bring the transaction times way down. If some coins stay slow, then others will be used instead for situations where you need to compete with the speed of a wire transfer.

Aren't the bitcoin transaction fees actually higher than what you would get with banks? I don't know how it works in the US, but I can do free almost-instant transfers inside Germany with no problems at all, including for online transactions (like Amazon).

For transfers under 500$ (roughly) the fees from a proper bank transfer will be more expensive.

SEPA has basically no fee and is usually next day, with SEPA SCT Inst it'll soon be 15 seconds (and no more than 20 seconds) with the same fees, after which bitcoin can't compete on that anymore.

You can transact using Ethereum in a couple of seconds. Multiple block confirmations are important to be sure you are in the longest chain. With big amount transactions you should wait for multiple blocks, being 6 enough to be extremely sure.

Digital currency isn't competing with credit card networks, it's competing with ACH.

ACH transfers take days; wire transfers take minutes to hours and cost tens of dollars. There's ever possibility of running a digital currency that can clear transactions on the order of minutes with minimal cost. Bitcoin isn't well suited to that, partially because it hasn't been managed well.

A credit card would still pre-authorize against a balance at an institution, but it would settle between the customer and merchant bank on the same schedule (when the merchant cleared their transactions for the week) or faster (eg, on the order of minutes). That makes credit cards considerably closer to cash (fast) than what they are now, like checks (slow).

And for people who wanted it to settle immediately or treat it like cash, they could make a direct transfer, and have it clear on the order of minutes. (Not great for coffee, but something like buying a car.)

Digital currencies can be those things, they're just not.

And for people who wanted it to settle immediately or treat it like cash, they could make a direct transfer, , and have it clear on the order of minutes.

Can you please elaborate on this a bit more. What is direct transfer and how is it different from bitcoin /ethereum payments. From what I understand, they are the same.

That was connecting on to the previous paragraph, and contrasting with pre-authorization through a payment network -- I meant a direct transfer of currency from customer to merchant, instead of using a financial institution as an intermediary to vouch for you having money.