Ripple’s dollar-backed stablecoin, known as RLUSD, launched today on several global crypto exchanges.
RLUSD is now available on Bitso, Uphold, CoinMENA, MoonPay, and Archax with other listings coming in the future, according to Ripple. The token is compatible with the Ethereum blockchain and the XRP ledger, a blockchain created by Ripple Labs alongside its native token, XRP.
While RLUSD is designed to maintain a constant value in line with the price of the U.S. dollar, it traded at $1.50 on MoonPay early on Tuesday.
Ripple CTO David Schwartz noted a potential for a price discrepancy in a post on X, before the coin even premiered, saying, “As RLUSD goes live, there may be supply shortages in the very early days before the market stabilizes,” leading the token to trade at a premium.
He added: “But rest assured, the price will come back to very close to $1 as soon as supply stabilizes. If it doesn't, something is very seriously wrong.”
However, $1.50 is just a small fraction of what RLUSD was priced at a few days ago on Xaman, a crypto wallet for the XRP ledger, as some overzealous Ripple fans made bids on the token leading up to its launch. These investors were willing to pay a high premium for the first few issued RLUSD tokens, bidding as much as 511 XRP or about $1,300.
As the launch of RLUSD drives volume to the XRP ledger, investors are also rushing to buy XRP, which is used to settle transaction fees on the blockchain. The currency is up 6% in 24 hours, hitting a high of $2.71.
RLUSD, which received regulatory approval from the New York Department of Financial Services last week, is part of a larger effort by Ripple to become the go-to payment network for cross-border transactions, with a focus on appealing to traditional finance institutions.
“The stablecoin market is going through this next growth spurt where there's going to be more institutional adoption that is premised upon institutional use cases,” Jack McDonald, senior vice president of stablecoins at Ripple, told Fortune. “So one specific example.. is for stablecoins to be thought of and used as the killer app for global payments.”
While much of the initial interest in RLUSD is coming from retail investors, Ripple plans to integrate RLUSD into its payments business to facilitate international transactions on behalf of the global banks and other institutional customers it partners with, beginning sometime next year.
