Galaxy

Ripple USD

Citadel

Fortress

Ripple’s $500 million raise in November marked a striking turn for a company once defined by its bruising, multiyear battle with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. As its legal challenges ease and Ripple pushes beyond cross-border payments toward a more ambitious crypto-native settlement stack, the company is repositioning itself in ways that are increasingly attracting major Wall Street investors.
The round, which <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/ripple-40b-valuation-citadel-fortress-investment" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Cointelegraph reported valued Ripple at $40 billion</a>, one of the highest valuations for a private company, drew an unusually heavy institutional roster. Investors included Citadel Securities, Fortress Investment Group and funds linked to Galaxy Digital, Pantera Capital and Brevan Howard.
New details reported by <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-12-08/wall-street-hedged-big-crypto-bet-in-500-million-ripple-deal-xrp" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Bloomberg</a> also shed light on how Ripple secured that interest — namely, by offering investors a deal structured with significant downside protections.&nbsp;
The terms allow participating funds to sell their shares back to Ripple after three or four years at a guaranteed annualized return of about 10%, according to people familiar with the matter. That option disappears if Ripple goes public within that window.
The company also retained the right to repurchase the shares itself over the same period — in that case, providing investors with an even higher annualized return of roughly 25%.
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 <img src="https://s3.cointelegraph.com/uploads/2025-12/019afea1-079b-7125-adca-886f5c90f081" title="" alt="Wall Street piles in: How Ripple’s quiet pivot led to a $40B valuation">
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 Source: <a href="https://x.com/Cointelegraph/status/1920622366893158458" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Cointelegraph</a>
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Related: <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/ripple-rejects-ipo-plans-sec-case-victory-record-growth" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Ripple rejects IPO plans despite SEC case victory: Here’s why</a>
<h2 id="ripple-broadens-its-reach-but-investors-still-zero-in-on-xrp">Ripple broadens its reach, but investors still zero in on XRP</h2>
Although Ripple has broadened its focus, including a significant push into the <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/ripple-rlusd-crosses-1-billion-market-cap-top-10-usd-stablecoins" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">stablecoin market</a> with its dollar-pegged Ripple USD (<a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">RLUSD</a>), some institutional investors still view backing the company as a bet on XRP (<a rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">XRP</a>), according to Bloomberg.
Two of the funds involved concluded that roughly 90% of Ripple’s net asset value was tied to XRP, despite the company’s repeated emphasis that it does not control the token and that XRP functions as an independent asset.
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 <img src="https://s3.cointelegraph.com/uploads/2025-12/019afeb0-d5aa-7efc-abcf-16e20d67f29f" title="" alt="Wall Street piles in: How Ripple’s quiet pivot led to a $40B valuation">
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 The Ripple USD stablecoin has grown to a market capitalization of more than $1 billion. Source: <a href="https://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/ripple-usd/" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">CoinMarketCap</a>
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Nevertheless, <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/how-ripple-plans-to-bridge-crypto-and-wall-street-in-its-4b-expansion" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">Ripple is positioning itself</a> as a company that can combine custody, treasury, prime brokerage services and stablecoins to help institutions access digital assets.&nbsp;
As part of that strategy, the company <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/ripple-closes-fintech-hidden-road-acquisition" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">acquired non-bank prime broker Hidden Road</a> in April, now rebranded as Ripple Prime, and also <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/ripple-acquisition-gtreasury-1b" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">bought treasury-management company GTreasury</a>. The two deals, totaling approximately $2.25 billion, highlight Ripple’s growing effort to establish a comprehensive institutional infrastructure stack.
Related: <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/crypto-vc-funding-november-2025-big-raises-low-deal-count" rel="noopener noreferrer nofollow">VC Roundup: Big money, few deals as crypto venture funding dries up</a>

Wall Street piles in: How Ripple’s quiet pivot led to a $40B valuation

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