The XRP Ledger is moving beyond payments and token transfers as Clearpool, Ripple, and Cicada work on a new institutional lending market. The project could bring corporate credit onto XRPL, with loans settled in RLUSD.
Vet, the XRPL Foundation community lead and dUNL validator, says institutional “lending is coming.”
But can institutional lending also create new utility and demand for XRP, XRPL?
Clearpool Builds Credit Market With Ripple and Cicada
In a recent announcement on X, Clearpool said it is building the credit infrastructure using XRPL’s XLS-65 Single Asset Vaults and XLS-66 Lending Protocol.
Clearpool said that it;
“Institutions were never missing on-chain yield. They were missing a venue built for credit.
Therefore, its new project with Ripple and Cicada aims to address that gap by building lending infrastructure directly on XRPL.
Cicada will handle borrower’s financial position, cash flows, and credit history before determining how much they can borrow and what rate they should pay. Borrowers and lenders will also need to pass KYC and AML checks.
Meanwhile, Ripple will provide the XRPL and RLUSD for loan payments and settlements. Ripple will also participate as a liquidity provider.
The goal is to create lending pools where vetted businesses can borrow RLUSD from institutional lenders and repay the loans with interest.
However, these features are not live on XRPL Mainnet yet.
Could Lending Increase XRP Utility?
The immediate benefit is expected to go into XRPL, but it may also create some additional demand for XRP. Clearpool’s lending platform is expected to connect with XRPL’s native AMM, giving institutions a way to move between RLUSD and other assets.
For example, market makers providing liquidity to XRP/RLUSD pools would need to hold both XRP and RLUSD. This could increase the use of XRP within the lending ecosystem and potentially reduce some XRP from the freely traded supply.
The XRP Ledger also burns 100% of its transaction fees. Every transaction requires a small fee in XRP, and that XRP is permanently removed from circulation.
XRPL Network Activity Continues to Boom
The XRPL network is already processing around 1.09 million transactions per day, although activity has recently fallen by 42.7% from earlier monthly levels.
At the current rate, about 117.83 XRP is burned daily, while the ledger has burned around 7,680.43 XRP over the past 30 days.
These numbers show that XRPL already has strong network activity and a built-in XRP burn mechanism. However, the planned lending market is still under development, so it is too early to say how much additional XRP demand it could create.
For now, the key development is that institutional credit is being built directly around XRPL’s native features, potentially giving the network another major financial use case.