Ripple Labs likes to boast about its growing network of clients - financial institutions that supposedly use xCurrent or xRapid. Ripple claims this network of clients, the RippleNet, counted over 100 members by the end of 2017.
Ripple likes to compare SWIFT to a “dinosaur”, and makes it clear that its goal is to challenge SWIFT’s dominance in cross-border transactions. SWIFT is used by about 11,000 banks worldwide, and processes over 30 million messages per day, which are used to perform about $5 trillion worth of daily transactions.
This means that every SWIFT member bank generates on average about $400-$500 million of daily transaction volume.
So, when Ripple claimed in October 2017 that its network of clients had surpassed 100 members, it seemed like a big deal:
Financial institutions recognize the shortcomings of traditional xborder payments and are switching to RippleNet https://t.co/mHzbzzIGb7
— Brad Garlinghouse (@bgarlinghouse) October 10, 2017
I have already pointed out, in Ripple’s “200+ Institutional Clients” Claim Is A Scam, that some of those Ripple’s “clients” weren’t real clients. However, I couldn’t be sure of how much exactly were real, and how much were fake - checking on every name on the list was out of my league.
However, Ripple itself provided enough clues, for me to figure out how much real clients it had, one year ago. The answer is: ONE. Despite claims of 100+ members in its RippleNet network, Ripple’s only real client was the Swedish bank SEB (Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB).
How do I know that? Well, first, check this video of Asheesh Birla, Ripple’s VP of Product, where he says:
“Over a billion dollars has been sent over xCurrent over the last year.”
Asheesh Birla, Ripple’s VP of Product
The video is dated March 9, 2018. Now, check this press release by Ripple, dated January 23, 2018:
“SEB, a large Scandinavian bank, has now processed close to $1 billion in cross-border payments over xCurrent.”
ripple.com
When did SEB start using xCurrent? Well, certainly not before November 7, 2016, which is the date of the press release announcing the SEB had signed a partnership agreement with Ripple. Unless they managed to get everything up and running in less than two months, it’s safe to assume that SEB’s whole billion dollars of transactions was all generated in 2017.
So, Asheesh Birla says that Ripple had processed “over a billion dollars” in transactions over one year, while SEB itself had processed one billion dollars using xCurrent, over that same year. Given how stretched Ripple’s claims are, I can assure you that had Ripple managed to process even just $1.1 billion, Asheesh would have taken the time to spell it out in all its glory, in the video.
So there you have it: the only RippleNet member who was really using Ripple’s xCurrent in 2017, was SEB. And this, despite Ripple claiming non-stop that it had many, many more clients and partners.
What about the other 100 companies Ripple claims were “using the power of Ripple’s blockchain technology for global payments”?
I guess they were just in for the kickbacks Ripple’s sales team offers to anyone willing to test its technology, to keep Ripple’s business model humming:
