Ripple Goes Full Matchmaker: Two UK Firms, Zero XRP Wedding, One Idle $16B Problem 🏦

Ripple announced two strategic investments in UK-based firms Zilo and Licuido on Monday, a move aimed at converting tokenized funds into usable collateral on the XRP Ledger (XRPL). Financial terms were not disclosed. Zilo provides global transfer agency asset solutions for wealth managers and has raised $58.7 million in total equity funding, according to data compiled by Traxcn. Licuido is a tokenization solutions provider regulated by the UK Financial Conduct Authority. Together, the deals are designed to address the problem of idle tokenized collateral, bringing regulated transfer agency, issuance, and collateral mobility functions to XRPL infrastructure. "Tokenization of assets is only the starting point: the real value lies in what can be done with a token, including buying, selling, and settling trades instantly, or using it as collateral to borrow, lend, or post margin," Nigel Khakoo, senior vice president at Ripple, said in the announcement.

The investments build on a string of recent institutional milestones for XRPL. One week earlier, London-based asset manager Aviva Investors launched a tokenized share class of its US Dollar Liquidity Fund on XRPL after receiving approval from the Central Bank of Ireland. Last month, Ripple launched Ripple Mint, a platform that gives institutions new ways to access, mint, redeem and manage its US dollar-pegged stablecoin, Ripple USD (RLUSD). Zilo's client roster includes State Street, Citi, and Fidelity International. Licuido Markets operates under the license of Sapeno Partners LLP.

XRPL ranks as the 11th-largest blockchain network with $368 million in tokenized real-world assets (RWAs), according to data provider RWA.xyz. Ethereum ranked first with $17.1 billion in tokenized RWAs. Total RWA holders rose 50% to 1.57 million over the past 30 days, while the total value of tokenized assets increased 1.5% to $37.3 billion. BeInCrypto Intelligence reported that the majority of the roughly $16 billion parked in tokenized Treasury and money market funds sits idle.

Tokenized transactions on the new infrastructure are expected to settle in RLUSD rather than XRP. XRP's role on the network is limited to paying transaction fees, set at 0.00001 XRP per transaction, which the protocol burns. XRP launched with 100 billion tokens and currently has a circulating supply of 99.986 billion, meaning roughly 14.4 million XRP, about $15 million, has been destroyed through network fees over 14 years. XRP traded near $1.07, down 1.25% on the day and about 63% over the past year, with a market capitalization of approximately $66.5 billion.