The Canadian cryptocurrency, Coinsquare, has announced plans to integrate Ripple to their website in the near future. This comes after speculation that Coinbase is quietly working on adding Ripple to their platform. What is Coinsquare? Well, its Canada’s leading exchange for trading Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other digital currencies. If you go to their website, they state the reason they built Coinsquare was to ensure that Canadians have a safe, secure and Canadian destination to access the world of digital currency. What’s interesting is that Ripple is said to have been built on the same technology as the New York Stock Exchange. Which definitely gives it some credibility.
In a recent television interview, Coinsquare CEO, Cole Diamond announced that the company is looking at ways to extend its line of cryptocurrencies with new additions – and Ripple is one of the first ones on the agenda. What is Ripple? It’s a cryptocurrency that launched in 2012 with the goal of being able to facilitate global financial transactions. It differentiates itself from other digital currency platforms because of its connections to legitimate banks. In recent weeks, financial services companies in Japan and South Korea have adopted Ripple’s technology, helping boost the price of the cryptocurrency.
But it differs from Bitcoin because Ripple isn’t created or “mined” by users. The company has control over it. Which makes it more like traditional currency. It created 100 billion ripple coins initially, and 38 billion of them are in circulation at the moment. Ripple management can release up to 1 billion coins per month, and this could oversaturate the market.
Why Ripple? It’s doing well right now. It did have a slight set back yesterday, but that happens to Bitcoin every day. In Asia, as of yesterday afternoon, the price was still well above $3.50 levels. Another reason that Ripple is so popular right now is because it offers blockchain technology. Why is this important? Some suggest that other cryptocurrencies are tied to some bad things like the dark web and terrorism. So you can see why some people would want a more accessible, and stable type of currency.
While the idea of Ripple is all very interesting, I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you about Facebook and cryptocurrency. Mark Zuckerberg has announced that he plans to study cryptocurrencies and other decentralizing technologies as part of a larger bid to improve Facebook. Which, I find extremely interesting. The key here, in my opinion, is this idea of decentralizing technologies. What does he mean when he says this? Well, he’s talking about Blockchain. And what is that you ask? Blockchain technology has created the backbone for a new type of internet. How? By allowing digital information to be distributed but not copied. Originally devised for the digital currency, Bitcoin, the tech community is now finding other potential uses for the technology.
Think of Blockchain technology like a Google Doc. Everyone has access to it and you can see what changes people are making. And while I’m not saying that Zuckerberg is thinking about this from that perspective, this was to show you how it works. I’m excited to see what Zuckerberg comes up with. It will definitely be interesting to see what kind of impact Ripple will have.