Ripple President Monica Long revealed that the company’s upcoming US dollar stablecoin, Ripple USD (RLUSD), has already received early customer pledges ahead of its official launch. Speaking at the Singapore Fintech Festival, Long stressed that stablecoins are set to become a “major trend” in the payments industry.
Ripple Awaits Legal Approval
In an interview with CNBC’s Tanvir Gill, Long discussed the growing market for stablecoins and their expected growth. “Stablecoins are generally around $170 billion in market cap today, but that’s expected to be north of three billion dollars in just a few years because there will be more driver needs like payments,” he said. “We’re talking about Ripple, and we’re spending over $70 billion in assets, so this use case is going to be a big trend.”
For a long time we have highlighted the growing interest from major payment players in acquiring transactional stablecoins. He cited Stripe’s recent acquisition of Bridge as an example of traditional financial institutions relying on the stablecoin environment. “That’s a high-paying player that relies on using stablecoins to pay,” he said.
When asked about competition with existing stablecoins, Long expressed hope for market growth rather than direct competition. “I expect the market to really grow,” he said. “From our point of view, we are guilty of using; we have customers who already want to use stablecoins for payments, so we think we can be a great provider.”
Regarding the launch of RLUSD, Long emphasized the importance of regulatory approval. “Ripple US dollar [stablecoin is] not yet started; “We are ready, but the most important thing for us is to get permission from the regulators,” he explained. “The New York Department of Financial Services is reviewing our trust application.”
For a long time we also faced the possibility of other fiat-backed stablecoins gaining prominence. “As more stablecoins are pegged to the US dollar and more stablecoin transactions happen in the US dollar, do you think a rise in the dollar would be the way forward?” Gill asked. He answered at length, “I believe so, and it comes back to use cases like payments where you think about traditional use cases and there is a real need for foreign exchange there. I think we will see new types of fiat currencies being converted into stablecoins. “
He noted regional preferences in the adoption of stablecoins, especially in Latin America. “There are certain markets, like the example we see in Latin America, where there is a preference for a stablecoin for the US dollar, but I think the world will open up to more types of stablecoins,” Long said.
After the event, Long took to X (formerly of Twitter) to emphasize the industry’s focus on stablecoins: “Back in a great week at the Singapore Fintech Festival—on stage and off stage, everyone was talking about stablecoins. I spoke with Tanvir Gill on CNBC about the growing demand (eg: LATAM wants stablecoins based on USD, but EUR and SGD can strengthen their place in the market), and that Ripple USD (RLUSD) already has customers ready to use how. when it is presented publicly.”
At press time, XRP traded at $0.60.
The featured image was created with DALL.E, a chart from TradingView.com