Ripple is working on a loan offering that will work in connection with its XRP payment solution

Quick Take

  • Ripple is venturing into lending, as a recent job posting illustrates
  • The company’s offering would provide working capital loans to its RippleNet customers
  • A Ripple spokesperson told The Block that the loan product would work in connection with On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) payment solution, which uses XRP

Ripple is building a lending offering, a spokesperson of the company has confirmed to The Block.

The company would provide working capital loans to RippleNet customers, and Ripple is currently hiring a director of product management for its loans division.

"We are expanding our offering to loans to further support our customers with their working capital needs – something that we know is a huge pain point for many of them," the spokesperson said.

Working capital loans are usually saught by small and medium-sized firms for funding their daily business operations.

Ripple's loan product will work in connection with its On-Demand Liquidity (ODL) payment solution, which uses XRP, the spokesperson told The Block. 

"The offering is still in its early stages, but we have received positive feedback from several customers. Global payments remain at the heart of our business, and we are excited to find new ways to serve our existing and prospective RippleNet customers," they added. 

Specific details of the product remain unclear at this stage since it is early days. Ripple is looking for someone who will bring the loan product to market "from concept to launch," per the open director position. It is seeking someone with "strong leadership skills" as they will need to collaborate "heavily" with internal teams and customers. 

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Ripple's move to bring in a lending product chief comes months after it raised $200 million Series C in December.

2017 mention 

It is worth noting that Miguel Vias, who recently left Ripple as the former head of XRP markets, first mentioned the company's lending plans back in 2017.

In an interview at the time, Vias said:

"One of my longer-term goals, after I get the ecosystem built out, after I get payments running through there, as I try to merge the two worlds, the digital asset markets and the traditional capital markets, as I try to do that one of the levers that we will be able to pull will be lending."

Ripple has over 300 customers and "more than two dozen" customers of the total base use the ODL solution to settle cross border payments. Some of the ODL customers include money transfer firms MoneyGram, Viamericas and FlashFX, online workforce platform goLance, and financial services provider Interbank Peru, among others.

The ODL solution currently supports Mexico, the Philippines and Australian markets. Ripple recently said the support for Brazil is "coming soon," as well as additional corridors across Asia-Pacific (APAC), Europe, Middle-East and Africa (EMEA) and Latin America (LatAm) are in progress for this year.


© 2023 The Block. All Rights Reserved. This article is provided for informational purposes only. It is not offered or intended to be used as legal, tax, investment, financial, or other advice.

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Yogita Khatri is a senior reporter at The Block, covering all things crypto. As one of the earliest team members, Yogita has played a pivotal role in breaking numerous stories, exclusives and scoops. With nearly 3,000 articles under her belt, Yogita holds the records as The Block's most-published and most-read author of all time. Prior to joining The Block, Yogita worked at crypto publication CoinDesk and The Economic Times, where she wrote on personal finance. To contact her, email: [email protected]. For her latest work, follow her on X @Yogita_Khatri5.