DriveWealth Taps Ripple's RLUSD on XRP Ledger to Fund 100 Partner Firms in Near Real Time

DriveWealth Moves RLUSD Into Brokerage Funding

Funding a brokerage account with dollars can now clear in near real time for more than 100 partner firms on DriveWealth's network, after the US securities-infrastructure company agreed with Ripple to run those flows through RLUSD, the stablecoin issued on the XRP Ledger. DriveWealth supplies brokerage infrastructure to fintech firms, digital wallets and financial institutions, and it announced the partnership on Wednesday, October 14. Its network supports investment services for more than 100 partners worldwide, and the deal targets the gap between market hours and banking hours. Funding is the sticking point: a partner firm collecting client money in another country still waits on correspondent banks that keep business hours. “We already run trading 24 hours a day, five days a week,” chief executive Naureen Hassan said. “Funding now has to keep the same hours, so customers can move with the market instead of waiting for it.” Most US equity trades exchange cash and securities the next business day under the T+1 settlement cycle, in force since May 28, 2024. Cross-border dollar transfers can take longer still, and the companies' announcement flags the lag as capital left idle and funding costs stacked higher. The fix is a tokenized dollar. DriveWealth will adopt Ripple's stablecoin infrastructure for payments in Europe, running RLUSD on the XRP Ledger with issuance and burn functions in play: new tokens enter the circulating supply as dollars arrive and leave it as they are redeemed. RLUSD converts back into cash almost in real time, supporting the collateral accounts behind securities positions. Ripple describes the stablecoin as backed one-to-one by dollar deposits and US Treasuries, a structure that puts real-world assets on a public ledger inside a brokerage workflow. The announcement landed while the XRP price traded 4.8% below its level of 24 hours earlier, a market backdrop neither company connected to the deal.

US Expansion, Custody and Ripple Swell

The scope reaches beyond payments. DriveWealth plans to extend stablecoin payments into the United States and will adopt Ripple Payments, Ripple's cross-border service, to collect funds from partners around the world. That rail matters for the same reason the T+1 debate does: money raised or returned across borders currently waits on correspondent-bank schedules that no trading clock obeys. Ripple Mint, launched on July 23, handles RLUSD issuance, redemption and management through both manual and automatic channels. Both directions matter: issuance brings dollars in as partners fund accounts, and burn removes tokens as cash is withdrawn. Custody is on the agenda as well: the two companies intend to build a digital asset custody business in Europe, with further markets to follow, and the institutional push lands weeks after Standard Chartered began RLUSD custody on the XRP Ledger on Monday, October 12. The institutional service has a familiar retail counterpart in the hardware wallet, where holders keep their own keys instead of delegating them. Equity financing is also under review through Ripple Prime, Ripple's institutional brokerage division, whose Delta One unit offers total return swaps, derivative contracts that deliver economic exposure to a stock without owning it. Ripple brings more than 85 licenses to the arrangement, the regulatory cover for moving regulated dollar flows between markets. Both companies plan to present the partnership in a fireside chat at Ripple Swell, the annual conference, in New York on October 28. The deal lands in a crowded stretch for XRP Ledger adoption: Evernorth is preparing to deploy a 473 million XRP treasury for yield with four partners, XRPL Commons opened the lending tools to 400 builders ahead of a validator vote, and XRP ETFs just logged their 13th straight week of inflows with a $740,000 daily take. Prediction markets read the token's year differently: Kalshi odds on a $2 year-end have fallen to 20%.

What the Terms Leave Open

This is a plumbing deal, and its value should show up in operations before it shows up anywhere else. The confirmed terms are narrow and checkable: European payments first, US expansion planned, RLUSD on the XRP Ledger with mint and burn, and more than 100 partner firms on DriveWealth's side. What is not disclosed matters just as much. There are no financial terms, no go-live date, no named first partners, and no mechanism that routes RLUSD usage back to XRP holders, so the token's exposure here runs through ledger activity rather than any direct cash flow. If near real-time funding works as described, the first group to feel it is DriveWealth's own base, the 100-plus firms whose end clients currently wait out the banking day for cash to arrive.