It’s not all about the bitcoin! Looking at the rating of currencies, no matter how we filter them, XRP is growing - a token owned by the largest banking consortium, which is in a state of a permanent transition into a new payment system. If you look at alternative assets and try to predict which of them will survive, then you should look at XRP. Everything in the cryptocurrency market is unpredictable - XRP has every chance to show good results in the coming year.
When describing of the development history of popular cryptocurrencies, it’s impossible to avoid noticing that the same people are involved. So, behind Ripple, stands Jeff McCalib. He is also known to the old people that lived before the internet as the creator of eDonkey, and for the veterans of the crypto market — as the creator of Mt.Gox, and today for McCalib - the founder of Stellar. Whatever it is, all of his offspring, except maybe Mt.Gox, which is still grabbing the daily headlines - are all flourishing. Ripple is no exception.
Ripple can be described as a payment system for professional market players. Yesterday's technology makes inter-bank transactions expensive, long and inconvenient and Ripple solves this problem. In essence, this is an attempt to build a universal protocol to gain access to the global financial market. Ripple accepts payment identification, currency exchange, delivery, and all this on our favorite blockchain.
If before, entering the market to make cross-border multi-payment was difficult, now, the financial issue is becoming technical. So, just join the system, and freely send money back and forth. It is a consortium of major players participating in the RippleNet system that gives hope that an increase in the volume of funds and companies willing to become part of the process will lead to an increase in the price assets. It would take a long time to go through all the brands: MoneyGram, the money transfer system, Santander and Unicredit banks, American Express and others - every day more are joining. It is not surprising either, the new world requires new solutions since the old ones are no longer suitable.
As in any other blockchain, Ripple has its own cryptocurrency - XRP, which is designed to serve, perhaps not as a stablecoin, but a bridge, for transactions between different currencies. XRP is an independent token which is traded on the market, and more recently, it has shown moderate growth following the good news. It would seem that here we have a banking consortium, a cryptocurrency that can be used in large volumes - and we have - the next bitcoin. But there is a catch - to use XRP you do not have to use RippleNet and vice versa. These are two different products.
There are a lot of complaints regarding XRP. Not everything is so smooth with decentralization - a large amount of tokens belongs to the system, an even a larger amount remains frozen. Once a month, a million new tokens appear on the market - which makes price predictions, very unpredictable - what we are seeing now with a price jump is not a fair reflection of the market growth, but someone's manipulation. Of course, if you wish, you can find a gate or a payment system that will allow you to make a purchase - but this will be a quasi-transaction: XRP is not a real cryptocurrency, and will never be that.
But there is no need to remain silent. With all the ambiguous assessment of Rippe/XRP, as a pair is not really connected to each other. Another bank joins the system, a payment system says it will start using XRP (it’s MoneyGram) while others say they dislike it a great deal (Western Union CEO), it's becoming more difficult to avoid talking about XRP. And even more so now, when it’s attempting to budge ethereum form it’s second place by market cap.
The RippleNet consortium is already too big to collapse in one day but is still too young, of course there are working solutions - TransferGo is already using the network for cross-border payments and it seems that the majority of those who have joined are only developing new products - the most interesting launches are to come in 2019. At the same time, the process of joining new companies continues - Ripple leads a rather aggressive marketing policy, finances universities and is generally working hard to remain on the front pages of the media outlets. However, the fact that Ripple is business oriented adds to the optimism. Integration into the network and the subsequent benefit at the expense of reducing the cost of transactions suggests that the ones who sat down on this needle will find it difficult to get off it quickly.
When it comes to XRP token itself, the story with it is not obvious. Yes, we understand that its use is limited to multicurrency transactions, we do not receive a share in Ripple, and that at any time a large emission can occur, which will affect the price. So perhaps not in the most advantageous direction for us. But the market - a cynical thing - the asset is being traded, it is volatile, there is liquidity, there is interest too - it means you have to trade it. Especially as in the case with Ripple, interest in XRP in the coming year is only likely to increase. Thus, we buy in - but remember, no guarantees there - either you are lucky, or not.
How to buy: despite the cries and requests that turn into prayers, one of the main trading platforms Coinbase has not added XRP support yet, but Binance, BitStamp or CEX.io for example are at your service - all these exchanges are quite popular and if you want to buy up a new asset, there are a few ways to do it.
It’s also easy to store the tokens, not everything is perfect, but popular wallets such as Exodus or Abra have long supported this cryptocurrency. Here, it’s also worth hoping for the future hype - sooner or later, XRP will take all the castles in its way. But these are plans for the next year. In the crypto world, it’s useless to plan anything beyond that.