XRP

Yo, XRP, dropped in 2012, is the OG currency vibing on the XRP Ledger (XRPL), a hype, open-sourced, free-for-all, and totally decentralized blockchain where anyone can jump in or make some trade moves. 🌐💸

XRP is used on the XRPL, which is basically the plug for payment settlement, asset exchange, and sending cash worldwide, kinda like that SWIFT banking network banks use for leveling up their international payment game. 🏦💥

Jed McCaleb, David Schwartz, and Arthur Britto cooked up XRP, keeping it real simple – just send payments between two peeps, ya know? 👥💸

Later on, Jed, David, and Arthur teamed up with Chris Larsen, who was cooking up a payment protocol called Ripple at his own joint, OpenCoin. 🤝💡

The squad linked up in 2013 and rebranded Opencoin as Ripple Labs. 🔥✨

As the big brains behind the crypto hustle, they designed XRP to launch with a whole pre-made stack, totally flipping tokenomics. 🚀💰

The XRPL came through with 100 billion tokens good to go, with the major share going to Ripple, leaving the leftovers for the squad. 🎉🔥

This pre-made move set XRP apart from other cryptos, 'cause they're not mining new tokens like they do with bitcoin (BTC), y’all. ⛏️📉

The founders dropped a cool 80% (80 billion tokens) of the pre-mined XRP into the company while having themselves a little slice of the remaining 20% (20 billion tokens). 💰😉

They did this drop to keep XRP stocks stable and help the fam by offloading XRP when the time’s right to keep things liquid and healthy in the XRP market. 🏄‍♂️✨

This play stirred up some tea in the crypto world, with peeps worried Ripple could totally mess with XRP’s vibe by letting too much XRP loose at once. ☕😬

To chill the scene, Ripple did an escrow move starting in 2017, locking 55 million XRP with the plan releasing 1 billion XRP every month, just A-list transparency moves to keep buyers and holders cool about XRP’s price. 🔐👌

Ripple Labs, still a private vibe, has its hands in developing the XRPL blockchain, while also managing most of XRP’s supply. 🎮🔗

The XRP Ledger is vibing with a global squad of 150+ validators, agreeing on happenings every 3-5 seconds. ⏱️🌍

While XRP and Ripple might get thrown around like they're the same, they totally hit different notes. 🎶✨

XRP is the actual native crypto, while Ripple (or, like, Ripple Labs) is the big boss company pulling the XRP levers. 🎛️🚀

Outta the 100 billion XRP tokens, a bit over 45 billion – almost 50% of the max supply – was chilling out in August 2022. 📈🌍

XRP’s getting traded on like 100 markets and exchanges worldwide. But heads up! Due to some beef with the SEC, lots of U.S.-based spots have hit pause on trading XRP until the smoke clears. 💼🚨