Average Broke Guy’s Quick Crypto Review: Ripple (XRP)

Company Description:
XRP is the Digital Asset for Payments. It’s the fastest and most scalable digital asset, enabling real-time global payments
anywhere in the world. Built for enterprise use, XRP offers banks and payment providers a reliable, on-demand option to source liquidity for cross-border payments. Using XRP, banks can source liquidity on demand in real time
without having to pre-fund nostro accounts. Payment Providers use XRP to expand reach into new markets, lower foreign exchange costs and provide faster payment settlement. XRP consistently handles 1,500 transactions per second, 24x7, and can scale to handle the same throughput as Visa. XRP uses open-source technology, built on the principles of blockchain with a growing set of validators. XRP's five-year track record of stable technology and governance makes it ready for institutional and enterprise use.
Reference: Taken directly from Ripple's official website, https://ripple.com/xrp/

Average Broke Guy’s Translation in Lehman’s terms:
Ripple aims to change the way money is transferred. The company has created a system to globally send money almost instantaneously using blockchain technology. The coin created by Ripple to use for these money transfers is called XRP. While Ripple hopes financial institutions will use the XRP coin for these money transfers, it's not a requirement. In other words, financial institutions could create their own cryptocurrency to use on Ripple’s platform.

As of today, Ripple has many high profile companies, like MoneyGram, testing their system with XRP coins. If these tests go well, and XRP is adopted, you could see a massive increase in the value of XRP coins.
The total number of XRP in existence is 100 Billion. There will never be more XRP created. Due to this, XRP is immune to inflation. In fact, Ripple is a deflationary currency. They actually destroys a portion of each transaction fee, slowly reducing the amount in circulation. As of today, 55% of the total number of XRP in existence is locked up in escrow. Ripple did this to ensure owners of XRP they wouldn’t flood the market with XRP coins. The terms of the escrow agreement allow Ripple to sell up to 1 Billion XRP tokens per month. The coins that are not sold in that month go back into escrow. To date, the most XRP Ripple has sold in 1 month is 250 million. This comes to about a 3% increase in supply per year. That’s much lower than Bitcoin.
Do date, Ripple owns 60% of the total number of XRP…most of which is in escrow. After the escrow contract is completed, Ripple will only own about 6 Billion XRP, or 6% of the total supply. While some say XRP is a centralized currency, you can see that’s not really the case…at least not long term.

Things to Consider:
Today, XRP has not been adopted for use by any major financial institutions. This means investors in XRP are simply speculating on it’s success. This is true with many cryptocurrency investments. The exciting thing with Ripple is, they have the team, marketing, technology and product to offer financial institutions today. Their turn-key system obviously is attractive to many companies, as is evident by the testing currently underway. Unlike many companies, Ripple has a finished product ready to go to market.

PRO’S:
-Large financial institutions currently testing Ripple’s turn-key payment system using XLM coins.
-Excellent Team, marketing, funding and product.
-Almost immediate transaction speed.
-Listed on all major exchanges, making it easy for investors to participate.

CON’S:
-No company has committed to using XRP...yet.
-Somewhat Centralized for now
-Highly speculative investment

Average Broke Guy’s Risk Rating:
Short Term: LOW (very popular and it works)
Long Term: HIGH (completely dependent on financial institutions adopting it’s use)

Average Broke Guy’s Closing Thoughts:
In my humble opinion, Ripple is a good investment with huge potential. Very few companies have this kind of financial backing. Their team is brilliant, product works as advertised and their marketing is tremendous. Some don’t like the centralized nature of Ripple. Personally, I think there’s a place for centralized currency in the modern world…and there always will be. I also STRONGLY believe in decentralized currencies. Both have their place and are needed going forward. With that in mind, why not profit off both?

Disclaimer: All Cryptocurrency coins and tokens are highly risky investments. Risk rating is based on a comparison to other cryptocurrencies. I'm NOT a financial expert nor am I giving financial advice. All information given in this article is purely for entertainment purposes. Do your own research and never invest more than you can afford to loose.