On April 8, Ripple introduced the acquisition of Hidden Highway for $1.25 billion in what it described as one of many largest offers ever within the crypto area.
Ripple additionally claimed that with the acquisition, it turned the primary crypto firm to personal and function a world, multi-asset prime dealer. Hidden Highway clears $3 trillion yearly throughout markets with over 300 institutional shoppers.
Massive prime brokers assist in the day-to-day operations of clearing, securities lending, and leveraged commerce execution, amongst others, for big hedge funds and institutional buyers.
“However the price ticket isn’t what’s most vital,” stated CEO Brad Garlinghouse, who added, “It’s that this deal marks a once-in-a-lifetime alternative for crypto to entry the biggest and most trusted conventional markets, and vice versa.”
Inflection Level for Crypto Adoption
Garlinghouse defined that that is the capital and exercise “that may faucet into XRP and the XRP Ledger’s bread-and-butter – on the spot, environment friendly, scalable and low-cost motion of worth.”
He added that as a substitute of ready for twenty-four hours to settle trades via fiat rails, Hidden Highway might be utilizing XRPL for clearing a portion of trades. It can additionally use RLUSD, the agency’s stablecoin, as collateral throughout its prime brokerage companies, together with cross-asset crypto and conventional instrument trades, he stated.
“With this deal and the backing of Ripple’s important stability sheet, Hidden Highway will exponentially broaden its capability to service its pipeline and change into the biggest non-bank prime dealer globally.”
At the moment, @Ripple introduced the acquisition of Hidden Highway for $1.25B, one of many largest offers ever within the crypto area. However the price ticket isn’t what’s most vital – it’s that this deal marks a once-in-a-lifetime alternative for crypto to entry the biggest and most trusted…
— Brad Garlinghouse (@bgarlinghouse) April 8, 2025
Garlinghouse additionally stated that we’re at an “inflection level” for the following part of crypto asset adoption, including that the US market is “successfully open for the primary time because of the regulatory overhang of the previous SEC coming to an finish.”
Nonetheless, the corporate has now shelved its preliminary public providing ambitions.
XRP Value Tanks
Ripple’s native token, XRP, has tanked round 10% over the previous 12 hours regardless of the announcement. Nonetheless, that is attributed to a wider crypto market hunch as buyers flee from high-risk property amid financial issues exacerbated by Donald Trump’s world commerce struggle.
The asset fell from an intraday excessive of just below $2 to $1.73 in the course of the Wednesday morning Asian buying and selling session as crypto markets turned pink once more.
XRP has misplaced virtually 50% since its mid-January all-time excessive equalling surge, nevertheless it stays one of many better-performing digital property this 12 months.
The broader crypto market was down greater than 7% on the day as Trump’s tariffs, together with a hefty 104% on China, went stay on Wednesday.
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