How does the electrum wallet 'payto' command work
There is one more step to actually process the transaction, you have to broadcast it. What you have got is a signed transaction which you can save (&amp; even send to someone else to broadcast).

The signed transaction can be broadcasted like this:

electrum payto &lt;bitcoin_address&gt; &lt;amount&gt; | electrum broadcast -

This will write the transaction to the chain. You can read more in the official documentation.