- Researcher says RLUSD has become Ripple’s main product, with XRP playing a secondary role.
- Researcher argues XRPL upgrades increasingly support RLUSD rather than XRP utility.
- Morgan points to rising RLUSD adoption on XRPL as debate grows over XRP’s future role.
Ripple announced it has secured a preliminary Crypto Asset Service Provider license in Luxembourg, clearing the way for a full rollout of Ripple Payments across the European Economic Area and complete MiCA compliance. The news was framed internally as a major regulatory milestone, but XRP’s price did not respond.
“Great News. Usual Effect on XRP Price. None.”
XRP lawyer Bill Morgan acknowledged the licensing achievement but was blunt about its market impact. “Great news. Usual effect on XRP price. None,” he wrote, noting that XRP has dropped roughly 3% alongside the broader market and is reacting to macro conditions rather than Ripple’s announcements.
The disconnect between positive company news and flat or declining token price has become a recurring pattern, and it is feeding a deeper conversation about what Ripple’s regulatory wins actually mean for XRP holders.
RLUSD Is the Real Product, Critics Say
A crypto researcher on X wrote one of the more detailed critiques circulating in the community, arguing that the direction of Ripple’s development has made RLUSD, not XRP, the company’s true commercial product.
According to the researcher, every major amendment added to the XRP Ledger in recent years has been oriented around RLUSD functionality, including KYC and AML authorisation features, smart liquidity pools, and compliance tooling. “The XRPL has become RLUSD’s rail,” the researcher wrote.
The argument extends to how Ripple’s payment services actually work. XRP, in this framing, is described as optional, used only when direct RLUSD liquidity cannot be found. “XRP is the spam filter for the transaction,” the researcher said.
The researcher also pointed to Ripple’s business interests as the driving logic. With banking licenses, payment services, and Hidden Road all built around RLUSD, there is little regulatory incentive for Ripple to actively market XRP going forward. “Ripple’s news is always going to be about RLUSD. It’s their true marketable product.”
Morgan Raises a Different Question
Morgan, who has generally been more measured on the RLUSD question, flagged a data point that adds weight to the debate. RLUSD holdings on the XRP Ledger are growing and approaching the volume of XRP held on Ethereum. He said that chain data on burns, holder numbers, transaction volume, and RWA inflows suggest Ripple is actively managing growth and rebalancing toward the XRP Ledger as RLUSD’s primary home.
The Tension
What the debate really centers on is a question that has followed XRP since RLUSD launched: whether the token remains central to Ripple’s long-term infrastructure or has been gradually repositioned as a secondary mechanism while the company builds its regulatory and commercial future around a stablecoin it can fully control.
Related: XRP Ledger Stablecoin Market Nears $1 Billion as RLUSD Surges
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