A viral video from 2018 has surfaced online showing CEO Brad Garlinghouse boldly declaring that Ripple is taking control FAST (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications). At the time, the cryptocurrency payments company was still in its early growth phase, aggressively positioning itself as a faster and cheaper alternative to SWIFT. Today, Ripple has evolved significantly in various aspects, including regulation, payments, global adoption, partnerships, banking, and more.
Ripple CEO boldly claims to overtake SWIFT
During a 2018 interview with Bloomberg, Garlinghouse was he asked whether he believed Ripple could ever take over SWIFT. The CEO replied calmly, “I think what we do and implement on a daily basis is what SWIFT is really taking over.” He stated that the company has already signed contracts with over 100 banks, noting that some of the world’s largest SWIFT-enabled financial institutions already operate Ripple’s technology.
Garlinghouse’s statement reflected confidence in Ripple’s growth potential and capabilities transform global payment systems. He pointed to practical real-world applications and explained that the money transfer company adopted Ripple’s technology in 2018 and reduced the price per transaction from $20 to just $2, leading to an astonishing 800% augment in usage overnight. According to him, Ripple can address this kind of growth and momentum while SWIFT struggles to support it.
Despite his bold vision, many in the crypto community remain skeptical today. One possible reason for these concerns is that SWIFT has been the backbone of international financial communications since 1973. As such, it has built decades of powerful standards of trustworthiness, trust, compliance and security – areas in which Ripple, by comparison, is still developing.
However, despite these long-term advantages, SWIFT falls brief in many areas that Ripple wants to improve. The system is based on processes that take 1-5 days to settle transactions Ripple completes transfers in seconds. Additionally, SWIFT transfers also cost $25-$50 per transaction, while the average total costs for institutional payments at Ripple range from $0.001-$0.01 per transaction, which is a stunning contrast.
One of the biggest disadvantages of SWIFT is that it does not transfer money directly; instead, he sends money messages when he is still based on pre-funded Nostro accounts. This dependency is a key area where Ripple has a huge advantage. While pre-funded SWIFT accounts and the operate of intermediaries sluggish down payments, Ripple’s On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) feature leverages XRP as a bridge currency to speed up transfers. The crypto company converts the sender’s currency to XRP, moves it on the ledger, and then converts it to the recipient’s currency – all done in a matter of seconds.
How Ripple has evolved since 2018
Fast forward to today: Since 2018, Ripple has overcome major obstacles, including: the resolution of an almost seven-year legal battle with the US SEC and obtain clearer regulatory guidance and recognition. At the same time, the company has continued to expand globally while also improving the XRP Ledger (XRPL) with up-to-date updates and stronger security features.
So far, the company continues its efforts to compete or cooperate with SWIFT. It has partnered with hundreds of banks, payment service providers, money transfer companies and other institutions. Ripple has also expanded its offering various strategic acquisitionsincluding Hidden Road, Metaco, GTreaury and more. As a result, the crypto company is now expanding its services beyond payments to include custody, settlement, treasury management and more.
Recently, one of Ripple’s most significant achievements was obtaining conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) for statute of the national bank. A full license would officially designate Ripple as a federally recognized bank, bringing the company one step closer to its goals.
Featured image created with Dall.E, chart from Tradingview.com
