By Solomon Odunayo
According to the recent report from the global market intelligence firm, CB Insights, Ripple is now one of the largest fintech in the world.
The intelligence firm compiled data on the largest VC-backed fintech companies worth $1 billion or more, which contains a total number of 66 companies.
Ripple, the Fourth Most Valuable VC-Backed Fintech Firm
On the list, Ripple, the San Francisco payment firm, with its $10 billion valuation, falls behind only Paytm One97 based in India, Shanghai-based Lufax, and US-based Stripe which are valued at $16 billion, $39.4 billion, and $36 billion respectively.
Read Also: Ripple Makes More Payments into MoneyGram to Boost Liquidity of XRP-Powered ODL
The cross-border payment behemoth has over the years striven to challenge top financial technology-related firms, which brought about attaining such a coveted position amidst the top fintech in the world.
The payment firm raised $200 million in a Series C funding round in late 2019. This funding round was led by SBI Group, Tetragon, and Route 66 Ventures. It was the same year Ripple sealed a strategic partnership with the money transfer giant MoneyGram, in a deal that cost the firm a total of $50 million.
According to Ripple, over 300 banks and financial institutions across the world are leveraging its payment technology to move money across borders.
Also, the firm owns about 60% of the total supply of the digital token XRP. Going by CoinMarketCap data, XRP’s total market valuation stands at $11.6 billion at press time.
On whether XRP is needed to keep Ripple’s cash flow positive, CEO Brad Garlinghouse in an interview with Financial Times said:
“Well, XRP is one source. I don’t know how to answer that because if you took away our software revenues, that would make us less profitable. If you took away all our XRP, that makes us less profitable. So I don’t think about it as one thing…
We would not be profitable or cash flow positive [without selling XRP], I think I’ve said that. We have now.”
Read Also: Ripple Delves Into Lending With XRP Credit Lines to Fund Global Payments
In the third quarter of 2020 report, Ripple revealed that it purchased a total of $45.55 million XRP to boost the liquidity of its XRP-powered remittance platform, On-Demand Liquidity (ODL).