Our last four editions of Crypto Finance Asia have focused on the cryptocurrency XRP and its blockchain XRP Ledger (XRPL), developed by the US-based technology company Ripple Labs. Let’s make it five in a row! XRP / Ripple continues to hog the headlines of the crypto and blockchain space with new deals and developments occurring on a near daily basis. After securing a major institutional dealwith Guggenheim Treasury Services, a major player in the commercial paper space that is now using XRPL for its Digital Commercial Paper product, Ripple has just announced that Ondo Finance’s tokenized short-term U.S. Treasuries product, OUSG, is now live on the XRPL blockchain, marking a significant advancement in institutional access to real-world assets onchain.
This latest move brings real-world Treasury exposure directly onto XRPL’s blockchain infrastructure, demonstrating a practical use case for tokenization in capital markets. Ripple has described the event as a milestone. The firm stated:
“Ondo Finance’s Ondo Short-Term U.S. Government Treasuries (OUSG) is now live on the XRP Ledger…This milestone expands institutional access to one of the most credible, institutional-grade real-world assets onchain—accessible via seamless minting and redemptions with Ripple’s enterprise-grade stablecoin, RLUSD.”
With over $1.3 billion in assets under management, Ondo Finance’s expansion to XRPL positions the platform among a growing number of blockchain venues facilitating tokenized treasury products. Ripple and Ondo are backing the launch with liquidity support to foster early adoption and utility, while RLUSD will function as the settlement medium, allowing financial institutions to shift capital in and out of Treasuries efficiently without depending on legacy banking hours or systems.
No longer theoretical
Ripple representative Markus Infanger emphasized the real-world maturity of this development, stating: “Ondo’s OUSG going live on the XRPL demonstrates that tokenized finance is no longer theoretical, it’s maturing in real markets. Institutions can now access high-quality assets like U.S. treasuries on public blockchains, with the compliance and efficiency they need.”
Ripple added:
“XRPL is rapidly becoming a destination for institutional-grade tokenized finance.”
Ripple vs SWIFT
Ripple is transforming traditional finance. It offers real time settlement, regulatory compliance, and already has wide geographic coverage covering six continents. It is at the forefront of blockchain-enabled finance and is tapping a market measured in the trillions of dollars. Think of Ripple as being on the verge of replacing traditional cross border payment systems such as SWIFT (which uses technology from the 1960s). At a recent event in Singapore, the firm’s CEO predicted XRP may capture 14% of SWIFT’s volume over the next five years, driven by a focus on liquidity rather than messaging infrastructure, and real time settlement with minimal fees. SWIFT is clearly aware of Ripple’s potential to make the decades-old payment system obsolete – there are now rumors about a possible collaboration between Ripple and SWIFT. While SWIFT remains the industry standard, it suffers from major inefficiencies: Transactions typically take 1–5 days to complete and come with steep costs and limited transparency. XRP, by contrast, settles transactions in seconds and does so much more economically. Can anyone spot the difference?