XRP transaction volume on the XRP Ledger hit a new all-time high this week, surging 65% over the past twelve months to 71 million transactions. That's up from 43 million a year ago, according to on-chain data. The record comes as a mix of exchange activity, stablecoin usage, and institutional products push the network's throughput to levels not seen before.
What’s driving the activity
Bitstamp, the Luxembourg-based exchange, is one of the top drivers. So is RLUSD, Ripple's US dollar stablecoin. Justoken, Braza Bank, and VERT round out the list of entities behind the surge. It's not just retail trading — tokenized real-world assets and regulated stablecoins are adding real volume, not just speculative noise.
Infrastructure upgrades
The XRPL has seen a series of protocol-level changes over the past year. Multi-Purpose Tokens with built-in compliance rules landed in October 2025 via XLS-33. Permissioned Domains went live in February 2026. Token Escrow enables on-chain delivery-versus-payment settlement, and a Permissioned DEX functions as a regulated dark pool. A native zero-knowledge proof verifier, built by Boundless and XRPL Commons, is now running on testnet.
Institutional adoption picks up speed
CME Group launched XRP futures in May 2025. Open interest crossed $1 billion within three months — the fastest any CME crypto contract has hit that mark. Guggenheim issued tokenized commercial paper on XRPL in June 2025, backed by US Treasuries and rated Prime-1 by Moody's. It's done over $280 million in volume. Société Générale chose XRPL as one of only three public blockchains to host its EU-regulated euro stablecoin, which went live in February 2026. And five US spot XRP ETFs launched between November and December 2025. Inflows crossed $1 billion by mid-December, making it the fastest institutional adoption of any digital asset since Ethereum's ETF launch.
What’s next
Two more protocol primitives are in development: a native lending protocol and Smart Escrows that combine zero-knowledge proofs with conditional settlement. Neither has a release date yet. XRP was trading around $1.40 as of this writing.
