Foreign media reported that Nancy Beaton, President of Uphold in the United States, said that traditional banks and financial systems are gradually shifting toward blockchain infrastructure, and the key driver of this change is not the price performance of individual tokens, but the ability of platforms like Ripple and Uphold to collaborate.
Transition from retail wallets to institutional interfaces
Beaton explained that Uphold initially focused primarily on retail wallet services, allowing users to buy, sell, hold, and trade digital assets on the platform. Today, the company is shifting its focus toward API infrastructure for enterprise and institutional clients.
She said this model allows banks and financial institutions to directly access Uphold’s technological capabilities to offer digital asset services to their customers without having to build an entire system from scratch.
Continue collaborating with Ripple
Beaton stated that Uphold has consistently collaborated with Ripple and the XRP Ledger. She also noted that recent enterprise collaboration partners include Flare and Firelight, with the goal of providing financial institutions with a more comprehensive pathway to access digital assets.
According to her, banks adopting blockchain is not just about adding a new asset class, but more importantly about integrating services such as accounts, transfers, custody, and yields into existing financial processes.
The key selling point is efficiency.
Beaton believes that the integration of blockchain into the banking system is primarily driven by efficiency, not speculative demand. She contrasts current on-chain transfers with traditional cross-border remittances, noting that international money transfers used to take two to three days to settle and could cost up to 10% in fees.
She noted that today, thanks to blockchain networks, cross-border transfers can be completed nearly in real time, with significantly lower costs—sometimes requiring only minimal fees.
XRP Ledger staking first-mover advantage
Beaton believes that XRP and the XRP Ledger hold a first-mover advantage in the adoption process by banks due to their early entry into the market. She argues that future transfers could become as routine as sending emails, and functions such as portfolio yield distribution and crypto asset collateralization may also be more naturally integrated into financial services.
Additional information: This report primarily reflects Uphold management’s views on the blockchainization path of banks. The statements in the article are based on respondent comments; specific bank clients or the scale of new partnerships have not been disclosed.