World's First Crypto Bank Adds Support for Ripple's XRP

Sygnum Bank, the first crypto bank licensed by FINMA, announced on April 30 that Ripple’s XRP tokens are now available through its banking services platform. Users can access deposit, exchange, and credit services using the popular digital currency.

Based in Switzerland, the bank will now allow the third most capitalized digital token behind Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH) to be used by clients seeking to diversify their direct investments in digital tokens, in conjunction with other asset management products offered.

Sygnum customers can use deposits in traditional currencies, such as the Swiss franc, the Euro, the Singapore dollar, and the US Dollar, to buy, hold and trade XRP tokens backed by the Ripple protocol.

Increasing liquidity in the banking portfolio

Additionally, customers can transfer XRP tokens to their Sygnum deposit account or increase their liquidity in traditional fiat currencies with a Lombard loan granted against XRP.

Mathias Imbach, co-founder of Sygnum, praised the announcement and commented as follows:

“We were impressed with Ripple’s excellent performance globally - they now have more than 300 financial institutions in their global payments network, RippleNet. The XRP-based solutions developed by the company resolve weak spots in the growing global remittance market of $ 700 billion. The low cost of transfers makes it an ideal tool to facilitate payments in emerging economies.”

The bank also highlighted that the Ripple protocol provides instant cross-border transfers at a low cost, rather than the traditional way of sending money abroad.

Sygnum’s customer assets are held in separate, highly secure individual portfolios. They are available in one click from each customer’s e-banking platform, and accessible anywhere in the world.

Interest in banks towards Ripple’s protocol

It is not the first time that a bank incorporates Ripple’s protocol in its operations. Cointelegraph reported on April 10 that Azimo, a digital money service, partnered with Siam Commercial Bank in Thailand to launch an instant cross-border payment service through RippleNet.

MoneyGram said in February that it received funds from the blockchain-based payments firm, Ripple Labs, to continue scaling the use of blockchain capabilities in its services.