Joining the exclusive club of Coinbase listee’s is a goal for any serious cryptocurrency. The positive effects of this cannot be overlooked; this event is one of those rare ones where both the rumor and the news cause people to buy in. The reasons for this aren’t exactly unknown, as the US-based exchange is one of the biggest and most respected platforms in the cryptoverse.
One coin that was mentioned plenty of times as the next Coinbase addition is XRP. The rumors started way back in 2017, with people feeling that the, at the time, 3rd most valuable crypto project on the market definitely deserves to be listed on the exchange. This rumor, combined with the general market upswing, saw XRP climb to almost $4 USD per coin. The murmur died down somewhat during the post-January downtrend but this was only temporary.
Late last year, Ripple offered Coinbase a sweetheart deal to list XRP (basically loaning them huge amount of XRP, essentially no risk to to Coinbase. They refused and many saw it as a bad business from Coinbase but this move is a clear indicator that there is some higher motive in Coinbase’s persistent snubbing of XRP.
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Coinbase Custody reigniting the old speculation
Coinbase Custody, the last launched service in the slew of solution crypto giant offers, added support for XRP. This revived the exhausting rumor of XRP to Coinbase even though there is no sign that XRP is coming to the Coinbase Pro or Basic any time soon. What could be behind two of the biggest fiat to crypto gateways, Coinbase and Circle, declining to list the world’s 2nd biggest crypto?
Coinbase Custody is a new service launched by Coinbase related to storing crypto, where it allows ‘Digital Asset Custody For Institutions’. e.g. it allows crypto hedge funds, exchanges and ICOs to store their crypto within Coinbase. Prior to the release of this, and similar products, storing very large amounts of crypto securely has been difficult, with many exchanges and ICOs being hacked and their funds stolen. This offers these exchanges/ICOs a place to store their crypto safely, and under the custody of Coinbase.
An important feature of Coinbase Custody is that it’s regulated, more specifically it’s partnered with ETC(Electronic Transaction Clearing), which is an “SEC-registered broker-dealer and FINRA member subject to regulated financial reporting and independent audits”.
Does this imply that XRP listing on Coinbase Basic is imminent? Not really – the Custody service is completely separate from other services and will list tokens more faster and offer more tokens than the retail platform.
Nasdaq to the rescue?
Ripple is certainly not sitting idle as they have been involved in extensive negotiation to form an alliance with the exchange National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotation, better known as Nasdaq.
This negotiation has been going on for a few months, with Ripple pushing its XRP token to be the first crypto coin to be enlisted when Nasdaq launches its crypto platform in 2019.
“The two-way process has been ongoing for more than four months and XRP is scheduled to be one of the initial coins listed when Nasdaq launches its crypto platform in early 2019.”
Nasdaq is great news and makes Coinbase less relevant for XRP.
According to the dialogue that has taken place so far between sources on both sides, this collaboration focuses on market capitalization that will place XRP in a parallel position with Ethereum.
According to a report by abacusjournal.com, a Nasdaq source revealed that the exchange is not interested in all the noise that occurs in the crypto market, but in scalability. Their exchange initiative going live in early 2019 can’t afford to ignore XRP, which ranks among the top five currencies by market capitalization.
Why does Coinbase ignore XRP?
BraveNewCoin wrote about this back in August and their top 3 reasons for this are:
- Incompatible ideologies – Amongst the devout advocates of decentralization, distaste for XRP has become commonplace. Along with infuriating the diehards, some aspects of this structure have prevented the cryptocurrency from infiltrating the top exchanges, even with an incentive. Ripple reportedly offered Coinbase a loan of over $100 million in XRP in exchange for a listing, but this wasn’t enough to sway them.
- Decentralization – One of the key principles cited by Coinbase is decentralization—that the network should be “public, decentralized and enable trustless consensus.” Despite Ripple’s adamant claims that XRP is fully decentralised, this is widely contested within the community, as the company arguably exercise singular control over the XRP ledger.
- Regulation – Should XRP be classified as security, it would likely become very unattractive to cryptocurrency exchanges at present—as both securities and the exchanges that offer them are subject to significantly stricter regulations.
Why do XRP holders care about Coinbase listing?
This market is dead right now and people are looking for catalysts, such as listing their token on Coinbase. Acceptance and ease of access is everything in the crypto world. The easier it is to buy something, the more demand will increase, which, in turn, increases value. Coinbase makes it simple for non-technically minded people to invest in cryptocurrencies using fiat. A number of analysts have already speculated that one of the world’s largest exchanges, servicing 32 countries, will be adding Ripple shortly.
However, the heavy centralization of its supply and blockchain go against Coinbase’s requirements and against the decentralized principles of cryptocurrency. Some experts feel that it’s worth asking if XRP is even a real cryptocurrency. With all this in mind, one thing is for certain: a lot of stars will need to line up before XRP becomes a part of Coinbase’s all-star lineup.
