What is Ripple (XRP)?

XRP has been one of the most popular cryptocurrencies in the cryptocurrency world for many years. As the native token of RippleNet, it stands out especially for the innovative solutions it provides to cross-border payment systems. So, what is XRP, how does it work and why is it so important? Also, what does XRP coin do? In this guide, you'll find details on everything from the definition and history of XRP, to how it works and its future potential. If you're ready to discover everything about XRP, read on!

Definition and Emergence of XRP

XRP is a cryptocurrency, the native crypto asset of the RippleNet payment network. Its main purpose is to make cross-border money transfers fast and low-cost. XRP was designed as an alternative to the slow and expensive international money transfer systems like SWIFT that financial institutions around the world currently use. While it is often associated with Ripple, XRP is technically traded on a separate blockchain network that operates independently of that company. As of 2025, the XRP Ledger network is integrated with new features such as the issuance of stablecoins, decentralized finance solutions, and Ethereum-compatible sidechains.

XRP was developed by Ripple in 2012. Its goal is to make cross-border money transfers over the blockchain technology-based XRP Ledger (XRPL) network fast, low-cost and reliable. Unlike Bitcoin, XRP Ledger uses a Unified Consensus Algorithm instead of energy-intensive mining. This means that network validators, as trusted nodes, can confirm transactions in seconds. Although XRP was initially called “Ripple”, the token was later renamed XRP and the network itself was renamed XRP Ledger to avoid confusion. The process on the Ripple network also allows for the transfer of money with cryptocurrency.

So we can explain the difference between RippleNet and XRPL as follows: RippleNet refers to a payment network for global payments. XRP Ledger represents the technology infrastructure behind RippleNet. XRPL is an open-source and decentralized blockchain technology. Here's how RippleNet handles the payment process, as can be seen in the diagram below:

The structure of the XRP Ledger is as follows:

Since its emergence, the Ripple ecosystem has grown in collaboration with banks and financial institutions. XRP's main use case has been to provide liquidity as a bridge currency between different fiat currencies. By 2025, the XRP Ledger network aims to increase its integration into the financial world with new features such as the issuance of stablecoins (e.g. Ripple's dollar-indexed RLUSD stablecoin), enterprise solutions for decentralized finance, and even Ethereum-compatible sidechains. With these enhancements, XRPL is on its way to becoming a trusted infrastructure for global transactions for banks, fintech companies and institutions with its regulatory-friendly structure. In particular, the fact that the lawsuit filed against Ripple in the US began to be concluded in favor of the company in 2025 provided an important clarity that XRP is not a security. Thus, it reinforced the initial vision of the ecosystem.

XRP's History: Key Milestones

2025 was a critical year for XRP, both in terms of market success and regulatory victories. In the first days of the year, XRP rose to 3rd place among cryptocurrencies with a strong rise in its price. Thus, XRP became the third most valuable cryptocurrency after Bitcoin and Ethereum. Positive developments in the long-running SEC case and increased institutional interest in crypto in the global market played a major role in this rise. But XRP has a broader history. The milestones for XRP in general, the history of XRP is as follows:

2012: The birth of Ripple and XRP

OpenCoin (later Ripple Labs) was founded under the leadership of Jed McCaleb and Chris Larsen. In June 2012, the XRP Ledger was launched and the XRP token was launched. A total of 100 billion XRP was pre-produced, most of which was held by Ripple Labs. The project was initially inspired by Ryan Fugger's RipplePay idea in 2004 and developed a network that, unlike Bitcoin, relies on consensus verification, not mining.

2017-2018: First big price spike

XRP, which was worth just a few cents in early 2017, experienced a massive surge in value over the course of the year, in line with the general uptrend in the cryptocurrency market. In December 2017 in particular, the XRP price skyrocketed to several dollars. In early January 2018, XRP reached a historic high of over $3 (around $3.84), which remained a record price for a long time. This surge made XRP the second largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization at the time. However, as 2018 progressed, XRP was also affected by the general decline in the crypto market, with its price falling as low as $0.30 by the end of the year. Still, the 2017 rally helped XRP gain global recognition and get listed on major exchanges.

December 2020: SEC litigation begins

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a lawsuit against Ripple for allegedly selling unregistered securities. This led to sharp fluctuations in XRP's price, triggering one of the biggest uncertainties in the project's history.

July 2023: Critical decision in the case

After nearly three years of legal battles, an important interim ruling was issued in the case. New York Southern District Court Judge Analisa Torres ruled that Ripple's sale of XRP on exchanges did not violate federal securities law. While this decision is seen as a victory that most sales of XRP are not securities, it was stated that only private sales to institutional investors can constitute unregistered securities. The SEC appealed this decision, but its appeal was rejected in the same year. Thus, the case ended partially in favor of Ripple. It took nearly 2 more years after this development for the legal process to truly come to an end.

January 2025: XRP soars

The XRP market experienced a historic rally. The XRP price broke the $3 level for the first time in 7 years, reaching its highest level since 2018. Still, it did not reach its record in 2018. However, with this rise, XRP's market capitalization crossed the $170 billion mark and became the third largest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin and Ethereum. XRP's performance was supported by the general recovery in the crypto market and the expectation that the new US administration will take crypto-friendly steps.

March-April 2025: Critical moments in the trial

The case between Ripple and the SEC is nearing its end. Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse announced that after more than 4 years of struggle, “the moment we have been waiting for has arrived” and the SEC will withdraw its appeal. At the same time, it was reported that the case reached the closing stage with a settlement of approximately $ 50 million and the official result is expected to be announced shortly. This development signaled that the regulatory hurdles for XRP in the US market are about to be removed.

In April, the court decided to stay the appeals process for 60 days to give the parties time to negotiate a settlement. Meanwhile, the head of the SEC, which is known for its anti-crypto stance in the US, changed; Gary Gensler was replaced by Paul Atkins, a pro-crypto figure. This change on the regulatory side has created a more favorable legal environment for XRP. Although the Ripple case is still a hot topic among investors, there is a general opinion that the process ended in favor of Ripple. This case, which lasted for quite a long time, was a process that wore investors out.

Why is XRP valuable?

There are many elements that increase the value of XRP and make it unique. These include speed, low cost, institutional adoption, regulatory clarity, technological innovation and market position. Let's examine these elements one by one:

Fast and low-cost money transfers

So, what are the features of the XRP token? First, one of the most important features of XRP is its high speed and low cost. But is the XRP transfer time really that short? XRP Ledger has one of the fastest confirmation times among blockchains. Transactions are usually finalized within 3-5 seconds and transaction fees are extremely low. This makes XRP a faster, cheaper and more efficient alternative to traditional systems, especially for cross-border payments. Many banks and financial institutions have started to favor Ripple's payment network and XRP over traditional networks like SWIFT. So Ripple has become a SWIFT alternative.

Partnership with giant companies

Another important factor is institutional adoption. So far, Ripple has partnered with financial giants such as Santander and SBI. In 2018, Spanish banking giant Santander launched the first blockchain-based cross-border payment application (One Pay FX) in partnership with Ripple. Thus, XRP was winked for banking integration. In addition, Japan-based financial group SBI Holdings shows a strong presence in the Asian market by establishing close collaborations with Ripple. Founded in 2016, SBI Ripple Asia brings together 61 banks in Japan to offer instant payment solutions using Ripple's xCurrent technology. This consortium aims to increase the efficiency of banks in Japan in cross-border payments.

As of 2025, these collaborations continue. Ripple has established an XRP fund with HashKey in Asia and partnered with Chipper Cash in Africa to create new payment corridors. In 2025, Ripple acquired a global prime brokerage company based in London called Hidden Road for $1.25 billion. This strengthened the XRP Ledger ecosystem with more than 300 institutional clients and over 50 million daily transactions. These developments increase XRP's transaction volume and reinforce its credibility in the financial world. Ripple CTO David Schwartz called the Hidden Road acquisition “a game-changing moment for XRP Ledger and XRP.”

Legal clarity and technical infrastructure bring value to XRP

Legal clarity and trust is also a key driver of XRP's value. By 2025, it became clear that XRP is not a security in the US. The settlement of the SEC case has boosted confidence in XRP and triggered the desire of major financial companies to develop XRP-based products. For example, giant investment firms such as BlackRock and Fidelity are reportedly preparing to launch XRP ETFs in the US. The consolidation of the legal landscape boosts XRP's credibility and supports its value

Technological innovations and ecosystem development are also factors that increase the value of XRP in the long term. The XRP Ledger network is constantly evolving and the innovations planned for 2025 increase the value potential of the platform. The introduction of Ethereum-compatible EVM sidechains aims to bring smart contract-like transactions to XRPL. In addition, steps such as the change at the end of 2024 to reduce the amount of account reserves from 10 XRP to 1 XRP have made the network cheaper to use and encouraged more users to join. Tokenization capabilities on XRPL are also expanding. The Multi-Purpose Token (MPT) standard, which is being developed to represent real-world assets (gold, bonds, commodities, etc.) as tokens, marks progress in this area.

If we look at the technology of the cryptocurrency, XRP was pre-mined when it was launched. So XRP is a pre-mined coin. The fact that it is not actively mined is also favored by investors. This means that a smart contract, not miner activity, controls the release of future tokens on the network. Perhaps it is this clarity that makes RippleNet stand out in the global payments infrastructure. As we've noted before, traditional cross-border payment systems face problems such as high transaction fees, slow processing times and complex regulatory requirements. To solve these problems, RippleNet uses blockchain technology to offer real-time messaging, settlement and payment processing between financial institutions. It is therefore hoped to be a permanent fixture in the global payments arena.

Who is the Founder of XRP?

More than one person was involved in the creation of XRP. The founder of the project is Jed McCaleb, who previously developed the eDonkey file-sharing network. In 2011, McCaleb came up with the idea of a payment ledger that would run on trusted nodes as an alternative to energy-hungry Bitcoin mining, a concept that later became the core of the XRP Ledger. In 2012, McCaleb, along with computer engineers David Schwartz and Arthur Britto, launched the “Ripple” project, coding XRPL. Soon after, Silicon Valley entrepreneur Chris Larsen joined the team and together they founded Ripple Labs. As the project's first CEO, Larsen played a key role in growing the XRP ecosystem through bank deals and investor relations.

Jed McCaleb left his technical leadership role at Ripple in 2013 and went on to found a similar payment protocol called Stellar (XLM). McCaleb, who came to prominence by gradually selling off around 9 billion XRP as he left Ripple, made billions of dollars from these sales and became one of the richest names in the crypto sector by 2025. He is currently working on blockchain and space technology startups (such as Vast Space).

Chris Larsen has remained on Ripple's board as Chairman and is particularly active on regulatory reform and environmental sustainability in the blockchain sector. David Schwartz, another founding engineer of XRP Ledger, is now Ripple's CTO (Chief Technology Officer), leading the technical development of the network.

The company's current CEO, Brad Garlinghouse, has led Ripple since 2015, although he was not part of XRP's original founding team. Under Garlinghouse's leadership, Ripple has made many deals with banks and financial institutions to increase XRP adoption and successfully managed the SEC litigation process. Indeed, Garlinghouse heralded the imminent conclusion of the SEC case in March 2025, calling it “a major victory for XRP and the company in every respect.”

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

As a result, Ripple has long been the focus of veteran cryptocurrency traders as it is a well-established company and is behind XRP. Moreover, it continues to come to the fore with its continuous collaborations. In this section, you can find frequently asked questions and answers about XRP and Ripple:

• What is XRP and how is it different from Ripple? XRP is a cryptocurrency developed by Ripple and is used to provide liquidity and accelerate cross-border payments in the global payment network called RippleNet. So, what is Ripple? While Ripple offers a payment infrastructure that uses XRP, XRP is a cryptocurrency and can be traded independently of Ripple. So the Ripple XRP difference is quite big.
• Who founded XRP?: XRP was developed by OpenCoin (later Ripple Labs), which was founded in 2012 by Jed McCaleb, Chris Larsen and Arthur Britto. In other words, this team is the answer to the question: Who is the founder of XRP? The team took over a previous project called RipplePay and created the XRP Ledger.
• When did XRP come out? XRP entered the market in 2012 and became the core crypto asset of RippleNet.
• How XRP works and which organizations use it: XRP is a decentralized cryptocurrency that runs on the XRP Ledger, enabling fast and low-cost payments between financial institutions. Through RippleNet, institutions such as Santander, SBI Holdings, SBI Remit use Ripple and XRP technology.
• Is XRP reliable, why is it so controversial: XRP is controversial for its decentralization. This is because Ripple Labs controls a large portion of the XRP supply. XRP is also controversial because of its long legal battle with the US securities regulator. During the case, many cryptocurrency investors questioned whether XRP was a security.
• Has the XRP case been finalized? Yes. The XRP SEC case, which began in December 2020, maintained legal uncertainty over XRP for a long time. But in July 2023, the court ruled that XRP was largely not a security. By 2025, the outcome of the XRP case was finalized. The SEC dropped its appeal and a $50 million settlement was reached between the parties. These developments created a definitive legal ground that XRP is not a security.

Explore our JR Crypto Guide series to understand the impact of XRP and Ripple technology in the world of finance!