What is Ripple?

Ripple is a technology that acts as both a cryptocurrency and a digital payment network for financial transactions. It was first released in 2012 and was co-founded by Chris Larsen and Jed McCaleb. Ripple's main process is a payment settlement asset exchange and remittance system, similar to the SWIFT system for international money and security transfers, which is used by banks and financial middlemen dealing across currencies.

The token used for the cryptocurrency is premined and utilizes the ticker symbol XRP. Ripple is the name of the company and the network, and XRP is the cryptocurrency token. The purpose of XRP is to serve as an intermediate mechanism of exchange between two currencies or networks—as a sort of temporary settlement layer denomination.

Ripple operates on an open-source and peer-to-peer decentralized platform that allows for a seamless transfer of money in any form, whether it's dollars, yen, euros, or cryptocurrencies, like litecoin or bitcoin. Ripple is a global payments network and counts major banks and financial services amongst its customers. XRP is used in its products to facilitate quick conversion between different currencies

To understand how the system works, consider a money transfer structure where the two parties on either end of the transaction use their preferred middlemen to receive the money. In effect, Ripple functions as a digital hawala service. Hawala is an informal method of transferring money, usually across borders, without any physical money actually moving.

Say that Lawrence needs to send $100 to River, who lives in a different city. Lawrence provides the funds to be sent to River to Lawrence's local agent, Kate. Lawrence also provides a secret password that River is required to answer correctly to receive the funds in their city. Kate alerts River’s agent, Asuka, of the transaction details—recipient, funds to be reimbursed, and the password. If River gives Asuka the right password, Asuka gives them $100.

However, the money comes from Asuka’s account, which means that Kate owes Asuka $100 (which will be settled at a later date). Asuka can either record a journal of all Kate’s debt, which Kate would pay on an agreed day, or make counter transactions that would balance the debt. For example, if Asuka was also Martin’s agent and Martin needed to transfer $100 to Etios, whose agent is Kate, this would balance out the $100 owed to Asuka, since Etios will be paid from Kate’s account.

Although the Ripple network is a little more complex than this example, it demonstrates the basics of how the Ripple system works. From the example above, one can see that trust is required to initiate a transaction—trust between Lawrence and Kate, Kate and Asuka, and River and Asuka.

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