XRP investors are voicing their concerns about the top crypto asset.
After a brief price surge to about $0.344 in mid-February, Ripple’s native cryptocurrency has since dropped back to Earth. The fourth-ranked digital asset by market capitalization has seen gains of about 5% in 2020, trading around $0.20 at time of writing.
The modest increase pales in comparison to Bitcoin, which has seen gains of about 32%, and Ethereum, which has surged 101% on the year.
With the price of XRP seemingly in purgatory, a Redditor is asking whether anyone is “concerned and alarmed with the constant pivoting and lack of clarity” from Ripple. The San Francisco payments startup owns more than half of the total supply of XRP and is pushing for adoption of the cryptocurrency on multiple fronts.
“Last year the deal with MoneyGram per [Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse] was a game changer and bigger deal than Libra, this year…. it was just a pilot. Years ago we per Brad… focused on cross border payments now it’s decentralized exchanges with a five-year goal? Dozens of banks will hold XRP? 300 plus customers in 40 countries? Customers of what? What are they paying for? [Zero] clarification? To me Ripple seems aimless, having a great product but trying to find something it’s good for.”
Some Redditors countered by pinning the blame on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for not providing clearer regulations. They say Ripple is hamstrung by the ongoing unregistered-security lawsuits.
But the original poster and others are skeptical that regulatory factors are keeping XRP’s success at bay, arguing that Ripple’s XRP-powered cross-border payments product, On-Demand Liquidity, still hasn’t taken off in regions where there is regulatory clarity.
“Banks and financial institutions in countries that do have regulatory clarity still aren’t rushing to get on board with ODL. It’s becoming more clear that no one really is interested in ODL. Time to start throwing this shit at a different walk to see if it sticks.”
More optimistic Redditors are pointing to Ripple’s partnership with the financial titan SBI Holdings as a sign of what’s to come. The companies are gearing up to launch ODL in Asia later this year.