Yesterday, September 14th, Ripple announced that it entered into a partnership with yet another bank, and this time, it is the Brazillian bank called Travelex Bank. According to the project’s announcement on Twitter, the move will mark the start of crypto-enabled payments solutions in Brazil, which Ripple sees as a massive untapped market that receives over $780 billion in payments annually from other regions of the world.
Our partnership with Travelex Bank marks the start of #crypto-enabled payments solutions in Brazil. 🇧🇷
With $780B+ in payments sent into Brazil annually, crypto will facilitate more affordable, faster cross-border payments. See how our solution will help. https://t.co/N8AOqk99kn
— Ripple (@Ripple) September 13, 2022
By enabling crypto payments, Ripple will allow users who are transferring money to Brazil to do it under faster and more affordable conditions.
A new opportunity in Brazil
According to the company’s blog post, Travelex Bank is the first bank in the country to operate exclusively in foreign exchange. As such, it was the prime candidate to become Ripple’s newest partner in Brazil and improve international payments for its customers using Ripple’s ODL.
The company further noted that there are many institutions in the region that continue to invest in fintech solutions, with a special emphasis on blockchain technology, cryptocurrency, and decentralized finance (DeFi). Brazil is also actively working on regulating crypto and it is in the middle of developing a framework that fosters innovation while still prioritizing security.
Brazil represents a massive opportunity for Ripple, as the country receives around $780 billion in payments every year. Thanks to this partnership, that money can now be processed much faster and sent at lower fees. The bank also intends to grow its support and expand into new corridors with new use cases, including internal treasury and bulk small- and medium-sized enterprise payments.
The bank was described as “100% digital and 100% personal bank” by its CEO, Ana Tena. Tena added that Travelex was the first exclusive foreign exchange bank that was approved and regulated by Brazil’s Central Bank. It embraces technology in order to offer the best possible solutions to individuals and companies alike. In other words, the bank is not afraid to adopt new technology to continue evolving with the times, and it believes that adopting crypto payments through Ripple is the next step in its evolution.
Ripple continues to grow
The story of Ripple is lengthy but well-known at this point. The company emerged about a decade ago, seeking to make crypto payments more popular by making them more convenient using its own technology, called the RippleNet. However, the company offered its tech to banks and other payment solutions around the globe, connecting them to a single network, which is faster, cheaper, and simply more convenient than SWIFT.
By connecting all of these different banks, Ripple became a go-to solution for fast and cost-effective international transactions. Users still have to go through the banks, but after they make a payment in their local currency at the bank, the funds get converted into XRP, travel through the RippleNet to the desired country, and get converted again upon entering the recipient’s bank of choice.
Over the years, Ripple has teamed up with hundreds of banks, and while some have given up on the partnership after the US SEC accused the company of selling an unregistered security token — many maintained the partnership, as their own regulators did not agree with the SEC’s assessment. Now, it seems that Ripple is still able to find new partners, and its mission of connecting banks from all over the globe into a single, more efficient network continues.
To learn more about Solana, visit our Investing in Ripple guide.