SWIFT gpi. What does it mean for Ripple?

Ripple’s Blockchain Technology

Ripple was established in 2012. They have negligible energy consumption. All 42,160,957+ ledgers closed without issue since launch. Ripple also maintains a robust and dedicated team of world-class engineers. XRP has a five year track record of stable technology and governance, and has been ready for enterprise / institutional adoption for some time. They have over 100 Customers with over 75 deploying commercially. RippleNet is new and highly innovative open source Blockchain technology. It is also highly expandable for years to come.

RippleNet & xRapid (XRP)

• RippleNet offers operational consistency. It’s a common framework of the most advanced Blockchain technology in today’s global payments, cross-border transactions and on-demand liquidity.
• xRapid provides on-demand liquidity utilizing XRP.
• XRP ensures payments are received & sent in local currency on both sides.
• XRP settles payments in 4 seconds or less.
• XRP consistently handles 1,500 transactions per second (TPS) 24/7.
• XRP is scalable where it can scale up to 50,000 transactions per second. The same throughput as today’s Visa.
• Open-source decentralized Blockchain technology and a growing set of validators.

Four key benefits of RippleNet is Access, Speed, Certainty & Cost

• Access – Accessing a standardized network of institutions worldwide.
• Speed – Transact in seconds, not days with instant settlement.
• Certainty – Get end to end visibility into fees, status and customer info.
• Cost – Lower capital requirements for cross-border payments.

Key Customers

• MUFG Bank, MoneyGram, FairFax, Santander, American Express, CIBC, BMO etc.,

SWIFT – Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication

SWIFT was founded in 1973, that’s 45 years ago. They’ve linked more than 11,000 financial institutions in 200+ countries/territories. Exchanging an average of 15 million messages per day, in the last couple years. (For comparison, In 1995, they would exchange 2.4 million messages per day). SWIFT does not perform any form of settlement or clearing. They simply transport financial messages securely for its members. A cross-border bank to bank transaction topically takes 4-5 business days, and sometimes 1-2 business days, depending on the type of transfer and banks involved. The SWIFT gpi is meant to better compete on transaction speeds and cost, all while continuing to maintain strict security measures.

SWIFT – Global Payment Innovation (gpi)

• Tracking payments in real-time, end-to-end.
• Faster payments by crediting international beneficiaries in seconds and in minutes.
• Fees and FX are now transparent. See banking fees charged and FX rates applied.
• Remittance data is unaltered when payment arrives.
• Reducing costs due to the ability to track payments.
• Optimized liquidity due to making payments visible.
• Implementing the gpi is easy due to utilization by using your existing SWIFT setup. (Note: Takes up to 3 months to go live)
• When your beneficiary gets paid, receive credit confirmation.
• Approximately 50% of gpi payments are credited in less than 30 minutes to recipients.
• The SWIFT gpi transacts up to $100+ billion usd every day.

My take on the matter:

SWIFT is a Dinosaur in sheep’s clothing. This is because of its gpi. They are working very hard to extend their very old network infrastructure. So far, it seems there gpi has achieved just this goal. It seems they’ve solved previous speed & liquidity issue for payments. There rates on the other hand are still too high. With the xRapid ledger, you not only gain faster transaction speeds and on-demand liquidity, but you also get it at a much cheaper cost.

Despite Ripples speed & cost advantage, and there steady growing list of customers and partners, SWIFT has one major advantage that will work in their favour. An existing network of over 11,000 customers, in which they can simply utilize this new gpi into their existing setup, and be up and running in 3 months’ time.

SWIFT started off with a commanding lead, due to its age, but they continue to extend that lead with its gpi initiative. Yes, SWIFT is in the lead, but in no way are they victorious. Ripple offers modern technological advancements and can do what gpi can do, faster, cheaper & on a scalable Blockchain technology. It’s now very clear to me that SWIFT was pushed into developing gpi due to the threat of Ripple’s ground-breaking technology.

Will we see a future (2-5 years), where we see both SWIFT and Ripple Co-exist? I believe so, but with Ripple’s xRapid and RippleNet increasing its customer base.

Unless SWIFT comes out with something totally new, Ripple’s software will eat at its market share for years to come in my honest opinion. Ripple simply needs to WOW the Banking Industry more than ever.