Adoption is something that everyone is looking forward to in the world of cryptocurrencies today. Many believe that until cryptos can be used to buy a cup of coffee, that it won’t be received by the masses openly. In fact, Ripple is working towards adoption. They’ve announced xRapid which is a product that will decrease the cost of cross-border transactions. Ripple has partnered with a number of companies already in the past including that of Western Union.
Swell Event
During the two-day Swell event in San Francisco, Ripple didn’t beat around the bush and tackled the question that everyone had in mind. A day before the event, Brad Garlinghouse announced that xRapid is now being used in commercial payments by three companies.
During the event, XRP in circulation was roughly worth around $21 billion while it is trading around $0.50 per XRP. Despite the bearish market, Ripple was already able to get the second top cryptocurrency spot in terms of market capitalization. And this happened not only once but twice.
The panelists were asked regarding xRapid. According to Nicolas Palacios who works as CFO of Caullix, which is a company that makes use of xRapid, “there is a big difference” between the traditional systems such as SWIFT and that of xRapid. Palacios mentioned that xRapid offers “cost-efficiency, time efficiency, transparency, and customer experience”.
As for Brad Ganey who is the COO of Catalyst Corporate Federal Credit Union, “We see a lot of competitive advantage to this moving forward”. He also added that given the cost of sending funds internationally, not to mention that it costs so much time to be received by the other party, the current method is “not the cleanest process”. He described xRapid as “a digital wire, It’s a faster wire”.
A Lot of Work Towards Adoption
Alfredo O’Hagan, the SVP of payment services at IDO which is a telecommunications company providing international payment services thinks that “education” is needed not only on the part of regulators but also on the part of internal risk management and compliance personnel.
Ganey mentioned that so far, they’ve met no resistance on the part of regulators. Michael Didiuk who is a partner at a Seattle-based law firm Perkins Coie thinks that working in the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for eight years, he doesn’t think that XRP is a security.
Ripple and Lawsuits
There are a number of lawsuits filed against Ripple. This was probably one of the reasons why Bitcoin and Ethereum were considered as commodities but not Ripple. Didiuk mentioned that “I think it’s a currency”. He also added that he thinks that Ripple will be adopted and that it is “going to have ripple effects—no pun intended”.
One of the things that caused a bearish market for the crypto industry in 2018 is the fact that regulatory changes happened. And though a lot of work has to be done, it seems that regulatory clarity is slowly happening as there are institutional investors that are now participating in the market. You have the likes of ICE partnering with Microsoft and Starbucks. And also, you have the possibility of having a Bitcoin ETF soon.
