Ripple cryptocurrency surges as Japanese groups agree to use it | Hacker News Reader

Ripple cryptocurrency surges as Japanese groups agree to use it

ft.com

15 pointsolivermarks7 comments

My theory to explain the price surge is that cryptotraders are looking for non-correlation against Bitcoin which is currently trading at such a high value that it is making a lot of people nervous. Ripple is the largest coin that didn’t participate in the rapid marketcap gains that the BTC bullmarket pulled ethereum, litecoin, etc into. A lot of traders hear ‘centralized blockchain’ and think that makes it a good hedge against bitcoin’s distributed nature - doesn’t seem to be a lot of understanding about how these bank partnerships work or what an investment in an XRP token actually gets you.

XRP was 100% premined. How many percentage are still held be owners?

My bet would be that the tiny float is multiplying the value. Because of that market cap of XRP is artificially inflated.

XRP network is not really a cryptocurrency, if you ask me. It is not trustless, has counterparty risk, is censorable, not designed to be a commodity in itself, etc.

I was actually playing with Ripple before Bitcoin existed, and it was centralized website. I could see it having some application, but it is just no the same game as Bitcoin and other altcoins.

Jed McCaleb has been selling tens of thousands of ripples a day for years. Anyone investing in buying is just making Jed richer.

Bingo. I think the delusion will persist if Coinbase lists it which is and has been the current rumor in the trader circles I frequent. I'd lose a bit of respect for CB if they did but it will certainly make them a lot of money because $2.00 is so cheap!

“2017 has been the year of the digital asset, and XRP has clearly outperformed every other digital asset,” Brad Garlinghouse, Ripple’s chief executive, told the Financial Times. “The reason for that is that the market has realised that XRP is a highly efficient payments mechanism that is solving real world problems for real world customers with real money.” “people are increasingly realising that bitcoin is not going to be a panacea for all these payments problems that people imagined it would solve”.

He added: “Payments with XRP settle in a few seconds, but if you buy a cup of coffee with bitcoin it will be cold by the time the payment has been settled.”'

great quote

Are banks actually using the XRP token, or just a private version of ripple technology? I can't get a clear answer on that.

Also is it possible for me to use ripple to pay for things today?

Hard paywall.

What I do not understand is why doesn't Wall Street create their own "coin/currency" versus use someone else's since they are the largest users of currency currently?

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