Ripple Labs closed a $500 million strategic funding round in 2025 at a valuation of $40 billion, led by Fortress Investment Group and Citadel Securities with participation from Brevan Howard, Marshall Wace, Pantera Capital and Galaxy Digital.
This was on top of a $1 billion takeover bid earlier in the year at the same valuation, providing liquidity to early shareholders without the scrutiny of the public markets.
The list of investors reads like a who’s who of institutional capital deployment. These are not crypto venture funds making speculative bets on protocols, but rather multi-strategy firms and market makers managing hundreds of billions of dollars in traditional assets.
Their participation indicates that something has changed in the seriousness with which the financial system views Ripple’s position.
At the same time, Ripple has been building aggressively. It acquired prime brokerage Hidden Road for about $1.25 billion, treasury platform GTreasury for about $1 billion, and stablecoin infrastructure company Rail for $200 million.
Launched and expanded RLUSD, a fully reserved dollar stablecoin with over $1 billion in supply, used for payments and as collateral.
He called for a US national banking charter and a Federal Reserve master account to hold stablecoin reserves directly at the Federal Reserve.
And it formally closed its existential SEC battle with a $125 million fine and an injunction limited to institutional sales of XRP, preserving the crucial ruling that exchange-traded XRP is not itself a security.
This is now one of the most valuable private crypto companies on the planet, backed by top-tier traditional finance and building a stack of infrastructure and regulated dollars. The obvious question: does a “bigger Ripple” automatically mean better results for XRP?
The answer is more complicated than the headlines suggest.
Equity is not tokens
The first clarifying point matters more than any other: Fortress, Citadel Securities and the rest did not buy XRP. They bought Ripple shares.
Equity holders have rights over Ripple’s businesses, including stablecoin revenues, custody fees, prime brokerage operations, software licenses, payment processing, and any financial benefits Ripple may derive from its XRP holdings.
XRP holders have no right to claim profits from Ripple, do not receive dividends, and do not participate in the governance of the company.
Tokens exist on an economic plane separate from the corporate structure.
The $40 billion valuation is a testament to traditional finance that Ripple’s corporate stack is valuable in a world where the GENIUS Act provides regulatory clarity for stablecoins and banks can custody digital assets.
It is not a claim that XRP will be worth more per coin tomorrow or that the token’s utility will simply mechanically expand.
That distinction should anchor any expectations about what this funding round really means for XRP holders. A larger balance sheet for Ripple does not automatically translate into higher token prices or expanded use cases. Create optionality, not inevitability.
The conditional positive case
There are plausible channels through which a larger, better-capitalized Ripple could improve XRP’s real-world utility, but each depends on the execution decisions the company has yet to make.
Firstly, Ripple now has serious firepower to deepen the financial rails where XRP could be integrated. More capital for liquidity programs, better integration of XRP into payment corridors, interoperability between RLUSD and XRP for multi-currency settlements, use of its main broker and custody stack to make
The bullish argument is based on capital and regulatory credibility translating into greater institutional adoption of XRP as a liquidity asset in cross-border flows.
Second, the SEC cloud has lifted. The company cleared up its existential regulatory overreach with a manageable deal that preserves the key precedent that exchange-traded XRP is not a security.
This removes a barrier for US institutions that were previously unable to touch XRP due to its unregistered security risk. A risk-free issuer backed by large investors makes it easier for risk committees to at least consider exposure to XRP alongside Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Third, owning Hidden Road and similar infrastructure assets gives Ripple direct influence over a portion of the institutional trading mix.
If Ripple decides to channel some of that flow through XRP for foreign exchange, collateral management, or liquidity provision, its infrastructure footprint could translate into non-trivial utility-driven demand rather than purely speculative positioning.
All of that describes the possibility, not the mechanism. The funding round creates avenues that Ripple can choose to follow. It does not require any specific results for XRP.
The risk of strategic dilution
The most uncomfortable and honest angle is that Ripple’s new strategy may also dilute the centrality of XRP in the business model.
Most of what investors are paying $40 billion for is Ripple’s position in stablecoins and regulated infrastructure, not XRP maximalism.
RLUSD is explicitly a dollar token, not a bridge asset. Its growth, backed by Treasury bills and bank-style oversight built into Hidden Road, GTreasury, and Rail, represents a direct bet that institutions want on-chain dollars with yield and regulatory compliance.
This is a fundamentally different product from XRP’s original “bridging asset between fiat brokers” narrative.
The framework of the GENIUS Act and the quest for a banking charter push Ripple to behave as a cautious and supervised financial institution.
In that world, RLUSD and custody fees are clean, regulator-approved lines of revenue.
Promoting heavy speculation in XRP or relying on continuous sales of XRP becomes less attractive from a political and prudential supervision point of view.
The more Ripple can generate revenue from stablecoin yield spreads, payment processing, brokerage fees, and software licenses, the less it will need XRP as a primary revenue driver.
That’s good for Ripple’s long-term solvency and regulatory position. It undermines the simplistic “XRP moons because Ripple succeeds” thesis.
There is also the reality of oversupply. Ripple still controls a huge reserve of XRP in escrow. A stronger balance sheet means less immediate pressure to sell operating capital into the market, which slightly supports the price.
However, those holdings are still part of what investors value when they value the company at $40 billion.
The market knows that these currencies exist. The funding round doesn’t make them disappear or commit them to any specific use case.
The tension worth exploring is this: Ripple is evolving into a diversified stablecoin and infrastructure company whose success only partially overlaps with XRP’s original role.
The token was designed as a bridging asset to address liquidity issues in cross-border payments. The company is now building a comprehensive financial infrastructure that generates predictable fees from dollars, custody and premium services. Those companies do not require XRP to operate.
What the $40 billion really means
An honest assessment requires separating what the funding round demonstrates from what it implies.
It shows that some of the smartest allocators in traditional finance believe in Ripple’s stablecoin, custody and prime brokerage strategy in a post-GENIUS regulatory environment.
It confirms that Ripple has institutional credibility and can access huge amounts of capital without going public. It validates that the company withstood its regulatory battle and emerged with valuable businesses and regulatory clarity.
It doesn’t prove that those companies are driving XRP adoption. It does not guarantee that Ripple will prioritize XRP integration over alternative revenue streams.
It does not eliminate the structural tension between what equity investors value, which is regulated and predictable financial services, and what token holders want, which is greater utility and demand for XRP itself.
The importance of a “bigger Ripple” for XRP depends entirely on the decisions the company makes with this capital and credibility.
Will Ripple use its $500 million and institutional backing to drive real transactional demand for XRP beyond speculative trading? Will it integrate XRP into its growing institutional stack in ways that stablecoins or plain dollars can’t match?
Or will RLUSD and the dollar completely cannibalize XRP’s bridge asset narrative, leaving the token as a legacy holding company that pays for new initiatives but doesn’t share in their benefits?
Currently, the funding round primarily indicates that investors are excited about Ripple’s transition to a regulated dollar and its infrastructure. For XRP holders, that represents an opportunity, not a promise.
The company has more resources to build rails where XRP could be important, with more resources to build around it.
The $40 billion valuation is real. Whether it translates into XRP utility depends on execution decisions that have not yet been made.
