Was Ripple not a cryptocurrency!? The differences between Ripple, XRP, and XRPL, and the mechanism that connects money
“Ripple is the name of a cryptocurrency, right?”
I suspect there are quite a few people who think that.
I understand the feeling of wanting to call it “Ripple” when talking about cryptocurrencies.
However, when I looked into it, I found some rather interesting information.
In January 2025, Ripple officially requested that people refer to the cryptocurrency as XRP rather than Ripple.!
…Wait, they corrected it themselves? 🤣
Moreover, knowing this difference changes how you interpret the news reported in October 2026 that “Ripple has obtained a banking license.”
This time, I’ll set aside cryptocurrency price predictions for a moment and organize exactly who or what Ripple is.
Ripple, XRP, and XRPL. The names are similar, but they are different things.
Let’s start here.
Ripple is a company that provides services for financial institutions and businesses, such as payments and digital asset custody.
XRP is the cryptocurrency itself.
XRP Ledger (XRPL) is a decentralized blockchain that records and processes transactions for assets like XRP.
And one more thing to remember is RLUSD. It is a stablecoin provided by the Ripple group that is pegged to the value of the US dollar.
To use an analogy, Ripple is the company that builds the services, XRPL is the common infrastructure like a road, XRP is the asset that can be used on that infrastructure, and RLUSD is a dollar-pegged digital asset.
Of course, it’s not a perfect analogy, but it’s enough for starters.
The company, the currency, and the ledger were not all the same name.
This is actually quite important.
In fact, the XRP Ledger existed first.
Let’s go back in history a little.
In 2012, the XRP Ledger was created by David Schwartz, Jed McCaleb, and Arthur Britto.
After that, the company that leads to the current Ripple was established in the same year, and businesses utilizing XRP were advanced.
A maximum of 100 billion XRP were created at the beginning, and it is not a mechanism where new ones are issued later through mining.
The founders initially transferred 80 billion XRP of that amount to the company.
From this background, we can understand that the company Ripple and the crypto asset XRP have a deep relationship, but they are not the same thing.
The fact that the company holds a large amount of XRP and the fact that the company can freely change all transactions on the ledger are also separate matters.
As a public network, XRPL forms consensus among multiple validators (participants who verify transactions) according to common rules.
Of course, this does not mean that there are no issues just because it is decentralized. The design problem of who to trust as a validator and how to maintain the independence of participants remains.
Even so, if you think of the company and the network as the same thing, you will overlook important parts.
Why was another crypto asset created?
Here, let’s talk a little about Bitcoin (BTC).
BTC is a mechanism that records transactions through a computational competition called mining and issues new BTC as a reward.
On the other hand, XRPL does not use mining.
The ledger is finalized through consensus among validators, and transactions are usually confirmed in a few seconds. The technical documentation for XRPL indicates a general guideline of 3 to 6 seconds.
The minimum fee for a general transaction is 0.00001 XRP. However, it may increase if the network is congested.
And what is interesting is where those fees go.
They are not received by anyone as a reward, but are burned.
The design is fundamentally different from BTC, which issues new currency through mining.
However, it does not mean that it is superior in every way just because it is fast.
BTC and XRPL differ in how they ensure security and decentralization, and international remittances also involve processing by exchanges and banks.
The fact that ledger transactions are confirmed in seconds is not the same as the time it takes for local currency to reach a recipient overseas.
These need to be considered separately.
Actually, XRP can also act as a ‘bridge’.
Now, this is where it gets a bit interesting.
For example, suppose you want to exchange Japanese yen for a certain foreign currency.
In traditional international remittances, multiple financial institutions and currency exchange mechanisms may be involved in between.
On the other hand, XRPL has a built-in decentralized exchange (DEX) for exchanging different assets.
Furthermore, there is a feature called ‘auto-bridging’.
Even if the conditions for exchanging Currency A and Currency B directly are not very good,
Currency A → XRP → Currency B
if it is more advantageous to use that route, this mechanism allows for an exchange via XRP.
Therefore, XRP is not just a crypto asset to be held or sent, but is also intended to play the role of a bridge connecting separate assets.
However, not every currency in every country is automatically connected. It requires supported assets, exchange partners, liquidity, and compliance with each country’s laws.
Still, the concept is interesting, isn’t it?
What we used to simply call ‘sending money overseas’ now starts to look like a problem of ‘which route to move the value through’.
So, what is RLUSD for?
Here, another name appears.
RLUSD (Ripple USD).
RLUSD is a stablecoin designed so that one unit is equivalent to one US dollar.
It uses US dollar deposits, short-term US Treasury bonds, and cash equivalents as reserve assets, and is utilized across multiple networks such as the XRP Ledger and Ethereum.
“Wait, if there is XRP, why is a dollar-pegged currency even necessary?”
Don’t you think so? 🤣
However, this is the important part.
XRP is a crypto asset whose price fluctuates in the market.
RLUSD is an asset intended to peg its value to the US dollar.
Even if the same company is involved, the roles they play are different.
Ripple’s payment services do not necessarily use XRP for every transaction. There are also routes that utilize fiat currencies or stablecoins.
In other words, it is not a simple relationship where “Ripple’s business expansion = XRP is essential for all payments.”
Even so, they are attempting to handle both the bridging of value using XRP and price stability through stablecoins within the same financial services world.
Here, the characteristics of Ripple’s business become visible.
What is the relationship with ISO 20022?
In the previous article, I talked about how global financial institutions are transitioning to the common messaging standard “ISO 20022.”
So, how do Ripple and XRP relate to that standard?
Ripple’s name is listed on the official ISO 20022 website as a participant in the group involved in the operation of the standardization.
However, that does not mean the crypto asset XRP has been certified as a global reserve currency.
ISO 20022 is a standard for exchanging financial information. XRP is a digital asset used for value transfer and the like.
They are different things.
What is more interesting is that there is a point of contact between both worlds.
Financial institutions are transitioning to a common information format, and blockchain companies are developing mechanisms for financial institutions.
So, what kind of mechanism will banks use in the future to move information and value?
And then, in October 2026, some interesting news came out.
October 26, 2026.
Ripple announced that it had received final approval from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) for its subsidiary, Ripple National Trust Bank.
“…Wait a minute. Did Ripple become a bank!?”🤣
However, it is a national trust bank, which is different from a commercial bank that collects deposits and makes loans like a regular bank.
It will focus on managing the reserve assets that support RLUSD and the custody of digital assets.
Still, I think this is an interesting change.
Crypto assets were once often talked about as a technology separate from the existing financial system.
Now, the company that has built its business on that technology is entering the U.S. financial regulatory system.
Will crypto assets eliminate banks? Or will they change banks themselves?
Next time, we will dig into this bank charter and the Nasdaq listing of Evernorth, a company that holds a large amount of XRP.
I wonder how much the world’s monetary system is starting to change without us knowing🤣