XRP and Ripple are back in focus as Ripple expands ties with BNY, Robinhood and Cross River while securing OCC approval for its national trust bank.
Ripple has strengthened ties with three financial companies that are simultaneously playing important roles in some of the largest emerging U.S. financial platforms, while the company has also secured final approval to establish a federally supervised national trust bank.
The developments have arrived within a short period. Ripple expanded its relationship with BNY and announced a broad partnership with Robinhood on Oct. 27, only one day after receiving final approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency for Ripple National Trust Bank.
Earlier this month, Cross River Bank also integrated Ripple USD and XRP Ledger support into its banking infrastructure.
Together, the announcements deepen Ripple’s connections with companies operating well beyond the crypto industry.
Ripple Expands BNY Relationship as Bank Supports XRP Custody
Ripple and BNY expanded their existing partnership on Oct. 27.
BNY already serves as the primary reserve custodian for Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin. Under the expanded arrangement, BNY now supports both XRP and RLUSD on its Digital Asset Custody platform for eligible institutional clients.
The companies will also explore additional blockchain applications, including tokenized trade finance using Ripple infrastructure and the XRP Ledger.
BNY separately occupies an important position in the U.S. government’s new Trump Accounts program.
The U.S. Treasury designated BNY as its financial agent for the initiative in April. BNY manages infrastructure for the accounts and is helping develop the platform through which families will access them.
There is no announced connection between Ripple and the Trump Accounts program itself. The significance is that the same institution supporting XRP and RLUSD custody is also trusted with major U.S. government financial infrastructure.
Ripple Partners With Robinhood
Ripple also announced a strategic partnership with Robinhood on Oct. 27.
RLUSD is expected to play a larger role across Robinhood’s retail and institutional businesses. Robinhood plans to use RLUSD on the XRP Ledger for institutional settlement, while Ripple Treasury will be integrated into Robinhood’s own treasury operations.
The partnership also extends to Ripple Prime and Bitstamp by Robinhood.
Robinhood is also directly involved with Trump Accounts. Treasury selected the company to provide brokerage services, while Robinhood Securities serves as the initial trustee under the program.
Again, this does not mean Ripple or XRP is being used for Trump Accounts. It shows that Ripple is now building infrastructure relationships with a company that also operates an important government-backed investment platform.
Cross River Links Ripple Infrastructure With Another Major Payments Provider
Cross River Bank provides the third connection.
On Oct. 15, Cross River announced that it had integrated RLUSD into its core banking infrastructure, with transactions supported on the XRP Ledger. The integration enables fintech companies connected to Cross River to access RLUSD payments through its banking platform.
Cross River is also the bank powering X Money, the payments platform being built into X. Cross River provides the regulated infrastructure behind X Money’s accounts, debit-card functionality and payment capabilities.
There is currently no announcement that X Money itself uses XRP, RLUSD or the XRP Ledger. The relationship is indirect: Cross River works with Ripple while separately providing banking infrastructure for X Money.
Ripple Secures Final OCC Approval
The developments come alongside another major regulatory milestone.
On Oct. 26, the OCC granted final approval for Ripple National Trust Bank.
The federally supervised trust bank will be permitted to manage segregated reserves backing RLUSD, act as collateral trustee for those reserves and provide fiduciary digital-asset custody services once operational.
The sequence shows Ripple increasingly connecting its XRP Ledger, RLUSD, custody, settlement and treasury businesses with institutions operating at the center of traditional finance.
What it does not establish is that XRP directly powers Trump Accounts or X Money. Rather, Ripple now shares key financial partners with those platforms while XRP and XRPL gain additional institutional infrastructure through BNY, Robinhood, and Cross River.