Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin is quickly increasing on Ethereum quite than the corporate’s native XRP Ledger (XRPL).
In line with CryptoSlate information, RLUSD’s complete circulating provide has surged to $1.26 billion inside 12 months of its launch. Of this, roughly $1.03 billion, or 82% of the entire provide, resides on Ethereum, whereas the $235 million stability is on XRPL.
These numbers present that the market appears to favor the deep liquidity and composability of the Ethereum Digital Machine over the extra compliance-focused structure of the XRPL.
Why RLUSD is rising on Ethereum
The first driver of this disparity is the maturity of the underlying monetary stack.
On Ethereum, RLUSD entered an setting the place greenback liquidity is already entrenched. Information from DeFiLlama confirms that Ethereum continues to guide all chains in complete worth locked (TVL) and stablecoin provide, offering a turnkey ecosystem for brand spanking new property.
So, any new stablecoin that may plug into main DeFi protocols like Aave, Curve, and Uniswap instantly advantages from present routing engines, collateral frameworks, and threat fashions.
RLUSD’s presence on Aave and Curve confirms this. The USDC/RLUSD pool on Curve now holds roughly $74 million in liquidity, rating it among the many bigger stablecoin swimming pools on the platform.
For institutional treasuries, market makers, and arbitrage desks, this depth is non-negotiable. It ensures low-slippage execution for trades within the tens of hundreds of thousands, facilitating foundation trades and yield-farming methods that drive trendy crypto capital markets.
Alternatively, the XRPL remains to be within the nascent levels of constructing a DeFi basis. Its protocol-level automated market maker (AMM) went dwell solely in 2024. So all RLUSD-related swimming pools on the ledger, such because the USD/RLUSD pair created in January 2025, nonetheless undergo from shallow depth and restricted follow-through.
Furthermore, the XRPL AMM design has not but attracted the liquidity supplier density seen in EVM ecosystems.
Consequently, a greenback of RLUSD positioned on XRPL presently finds far fewer venues for swaps, leverage, or yield than the identical greenback deployed on Ethereum.
RLUSD’s rising person base on Ethereum
Critics would possibly argue that RLUSD’s Ethereum provide is merely “vainness metrics,” massive sums minted however sitting idle.
Nevertheless, a deeper evaluation of on-chain switch information refutes this. RLUSD is exhibiting a real product-market match with Ethereum, characterised by excessive velocity and recurring utilization.
In line with Token Terminal, weekly RLUSD switch quantity on Ethereum now averages roughly $1.0 billion, a dramatic enhance from the $66 million common seen at the beginning of the yr.
The info reveals an obvious structural shift of a gentle upward pattern by means of the primary half of 2025, adopted by a “re-basing” to a considerably larger ground within the second half.
Crucially, latest weeks present exercise clustering round this elevated stage quite than spiking and reverting. In market construction phrases, a rising baseline sometimes indicators a transition from a distribution part to a utility part.
This suggests that the token is being utilized in ongoing, recurring flows, akin to institutional settlement and industrial funds, quite than remoted speculative occasions.
Switch counts assist this thesis. Weekly transactions on Ethereum now common 7,000, up from 240 in January.
The truth that switch counts are rising in parallel with quantity is a essential well being indicator. If quantity had been rising whereas counts remained flat, it will recommend a market dominated by a number of whales shifting large sums. As a substitute, the concurrent rise factors to broader participation.
Moreover, the holder information recommend a wholesome dispersion of threat. In line with information from Etherscan, Ripple’s RLUSD has attracted roughly 6,400 on-chain holders on Ethereum as of late November 2025, up from simply 750 at the beginning of the yr.
Whereas the availability progress has been pushed by “chunky” batch issuances quite than drip minting, the holder rely has adopted a clean upward curve.
The friction between RLUSD and XRPL
The structural divergence between the 2 networks explains why the “permissionless” progress loop has favored Ethereum.
On Ethereum, RLUSD capabilities as a regular ERC-20 token. Wallets, custodians, accounting middleware, and DeFi aggregators are already optimized for this normal.
As soon as a protocol like Curve “wires in” a token, it turns into a part of the usual dollar-pair universe alongside USDC and USDT, accessible to any handle with out prior authorization.
Alternatively, XRPL’s design decisions, whereas technically strong, impose considerably larger friction on the person.
To carry RLUSD on the native ledger, customers usually should keep an XRP stability to fulfill reserve necessities and configure a particular trustline to the issuer. If the issuer permits the `RequireAuth` setting, which is a function designed for strict compliance and granular management, accounts should be explicitly allow-listed earlier than they will obtain tokens.
So, whereas Ripple notes that these options attraction to banks that require express management, they act as a brake on natural adoption.
Primarily, the compliance instruments that make XRPL enticing to regulated entities are the identical options that decelerate wallet-to-wallet distribution.
In a market the place capital seeks the trail of least resistance, the operational burden of trustlines renders XRPL much less aggressive for the high-frequency, automated flows that outline DeFi.
RLUSD’s path to progress
Regardless of the ledger imbalance, the general trajectory of RLUSD places Ripple inside placing distance of a significant market tier.
Token Terminal has acknowledged that Ripple would cement itself because the third-largest stablecoin issuer globally, behind solely the incumbents Tether and Circle, if RLLUSD’s market cap had been to develop 10x from present ranges.
Contemplating this, RLUSD’s progress relies upon closely on whether or not Ripple can leverage its Ethereum success to ultimately jumpstart its native chain.
A base-case projection for the following six months sees RLUSD’s Ethereum provide climb from roughly $1.0 billion to a variety of $1.4 billion to $1.7 billion. This assumes that Curve liquidity stays within the $60 million to $100 million band and that CEX and OTC demand continues to develop.
Underneath this path, XRPL would possible see its swimming pools accumulate extra liquidity over time however stay a small fraction of the mixture issuance.
In the meantime, a extra aggressive “catch-up” situation for XRPL would require deliberate market intervention. If Ripple or its companions decide to multi-month AMM reward applications and efficiently masks trustline configurations behind single-click pockets interfaces, the native ledger may start to erode Ethereum’s lead.
With these levers, XRPL liquidity may plausibly attain $500 million and declare as much as 25% of the entire provide.
Nevertheless, the draw back threat for the native ledger is actual. If Ethereum cements its lead and the Curve USDC/RLUSD pool expands past $150 million, the community results could develop into insurmountable. In that situation, Ethereum may retain 80% to 90% of the availability indefinitely.
For now, Ripple finds itself in a paradoxical place: to reach its ambition to develop into a top-tier stablecoin issuer, it should depend on the infrastructure of its greatest rival.
