Ripple Labs Eyes Traditional Finance After Funding, Acquisitions
After raising $500 million in funding, increasing its valuation to approximately $40 billion, what does Ripple Labs, the blockchain company known for its cryptocurrency XRP, do for an encore?
According to CEO Brad Garlinghouse, the next move is building a bridge between the cryptocurrency industry and traditional financial services, leveraging blockchain to enhance transaction speed, cost and efficiency.
Over the past year, Ripple has made multiple acquisitions and launched initiatives aimed at integrating blockchain technology into conventional banking and finance.
In an interview with CNBC’s “Crypto World” at the Ripple Swell 2025 conference in New York, Garlinghouse said, “The assets we have been buying have been on the traditional finance side, so we can bring crypto-enabled solutions to that traditional financial world.”
This year, the company acquired treasury management platform GTreasury for more than $1 billion and brokerage firm Hidden Road for nearly $1.3 billion.
Hidden Road then became Ripple Prime, a brokerage service providing investors with access to over-the-counter spot trading of digital tokens.
CNBC reported that Ripple also plans to form partnerships to lend its XRP Ledger technology, a decentralized blockchain aimed to facilitate fast, low-cost transactions, to larger financial institutions’ crypto pushes.
Regulatory developments in the U.S. this year have contributed to a more favorable environment for digital assets. Agencies such as the SEC and the CFTC have loosened previous restrictions, prompting Bank of America, Citigroup and JPMorgan to engage with stablecoins, cryptocurrency custody services and blockchain-based deposit products.
“ The more we can build utility and really scale solutions that take advantage of XRP at the core, the more that will be uniquely good for the XRP ecosystem,” Garlinghouse said.
However, there are challenges ahead for the broader adoption of blockchain technology by traditional finance institutions. While CNBC reported that a digital assets market structure bill called the Clarity Act is in play, the federal government shutdown is almost in its sixth week and efforts to establish new legislative guidelines for the crypto industry are at a standstill.
“Banks are looking for and need that clarity for them to really lean in,” Garlinghouse said.
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