Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse Says Banks Are Poised to ‘Flip the Switch’ on XRP

[Pegasus]

The CEO of the San Francisco payment startup Ripple says banks and financial institutions are poised to “flip the switch” and integrate the digital asset XRP.

In a new interview, Brad Garlinghouse told Fortune that he believes many of the 200 banks and financial institutions that have joined Ripple’s network are gearing up to utilize xRapid, which uses XRP to boost cross-border payments.

“This is the year the wheat will be separated from the chaff. Not many months ago, the media was saying no one will use XRP, which made for good skeptical headlines. Today, you can’t say that, as people are starting to use xRapid because it’s better, faster and cheaper.”

Euro Exim Bank just announced it will become the first bank to commercially implement xRapid to power payments for its customers.

With branches in London and St. Lucia, Exim says it will begin using xRapid in the first quarter of this year. In the long run, it plans to use the digital asset to power payments for its customers in 80 countries around the world.

Euro Exim is one of five new companies that Ripple says will use XRP to power payments on behalf of their customers.

Here are the other four.

• JNFX, London-based foreign exchange firm
• SendFriend, New York-based fintech for global remittance market
  
• Transpaygo, Vienna-based fintech for mobile payments
  
• Financial Transaction Control Systems (FTCS), Stockholm-based company building financial infrastructure
  

Ripple owns about 60% of the total supply of XRP. Ripple has the majority of its XRP locked in escrow and regularly sells portions of its holdings to institutions and cryptocurrency exchanges.

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