XRP and Swift: What 10 Years of Documents Actually Show

Why not use Ripple's technology to do that?

Because well, we'll have to see. I think what we are seeing we we had a long discussion about blockchain versus API. What we could see is the API technology which is at the heart of what we do with GPI is here today and and banks are able to integrate it. Blockchain we think is further out.

Further out? That was the chief executive of Swift on CNBC in January 2019. He'd just been asked why Swift didn't simply use Ripple's technology and his answer was that blockchain was further out. Less than 7 years later Swift announced it was adding a blockchain based ledger to its own infrastructure. And in July 2026 when a post went round claiming Swift would support tokens like XRP, the man who would run innovation at Swift for 6 years replied with two words, not happening.

So which is it? Is Ripple Swift's enemy, is future partner or something nobody's allowed to talk about? For years the XRP community has built a story out of pieces. A lawsuit here, a proof of concept there, a quote, a screenshot. Most people have only ever seen the pieces.

So I went back and pulled the originals, 10 years of them. In order, the deal that turned into a lawsuit, the day the bosses of Ripple and Swift went head-to-head on CNBC panel. I actually pulled the app that put XRP and Swift in the same sentence, the ledger Swift has started rolling out and the document that I actually matters more than all of them that I just mentioned which isn't in Swift's archive at all. So stick with this all the way to the end, okay? And you're going to see what the paper trail actually proves and what it doesn't.

As always guys, this is not financial advice, please do your own research. We're going to run the intro and when we get back, it's time to go. Let's run it.

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So welcome back to the Bull Runners channel. My name is George Lee. We're going to be talking about a link in the description throughout this video because it changed my life and it can change yours too. So stay tuned for that. Now, let's get into the deep of this.

All right, the trail starts with a company called R3. It was a blockchain consortium backed by dozens of the world's biggest banks and it built its own platform called Coda. Now, in September 2016, Ripple did a deal with R3. As part of it, R3 got the option to buy 5 billion XRP at less than 1/8 cent each. Now, 8 and 1/2 tenths of a cent to be exact anytime up to September 2019.

At the time, that looked like a small side deal. The XRP took it off in 2017, it rose thousands of percent. That option went from pocket change to more than a billion dollars. In June 2017, Brad Garlinghouse, Ripple's chief executive, emailed R3's chief executive, David Rutter, and actually terminated the option. Now, we go to the September 2017 on the 8th.

Both companies went to court on the same day. R3 sued Ripple in Delaware and later in New York to get the option back. That's what they did. Ripple sued R3 in California saying R3 had misrepresented what it could deliver and only wanted the option once XRP's price had soared. A month later, on the 13th of October, Garlinghouse posted that Ripple had prevailed and that a Delaware judge had just thrown out R3's case.

R3 replied with the same day saying Delaware had only ruled it wasn't the right court. Nothing had actually been decided on the merits. Keep that in mind, right? Even at the time, each side was telling its own version. And and while the lawyers fought, Ripple was actually taking on Swift in public.

Let's have a look at Garlinghouse now on Bloomberg in March 2018. Check this out.

So, RippleNet is trying to take on Swift. What's been the traction like? Who's come on board?

Well, it it's interesting as you step back and look at this. If you and I decided we were to send $10,000 to California today, the fastest way is for us to do it would be to drive to the airport and fly it there. That's a crazy thing to think about when you're in the age of the internet and you know, we're used to information on demand.

Drive to the airport and fly it there. Now, that was Ripple's pitch. Around the same time, Ripple's official account was quoting him claiming Swift has published error rate of 6%. And if that was a figure that was later disputed and a few months later, he actually posted that Swift's upgrade called GPI was like putting a Ferrari shell on a Model T engine. Now, look at the last part of that second post.

Messaging is still not tied to settlement. Remember that line because Swift actually comes back to it later. But in 2018, the biggest banks weren't buying it. Not the software, the coin, right? Bloomberg asked seven of them.

So, watch this.

But the problem here is that its customers, banks, aren't buying into its proposition.

That's right. We spoke to executives at seven of the largest banks in the world who are at the heart of the corresponding banking system where you move money from the United States to Africa or Asia or corporations need to make payments around the world. Um None of those executives want to use XRP. They They don't want to get involved with cryptocurrency.

None of them wanted to use XRP. And then the report said this. Check this out.

We understand that that the value of that digital money is based on the fact that banks and payment companies will use this digital currency to move money around the world and yet that's not happening.

That's not happening. Bloomberg in 2018 said not happening. Swift's former innovation chief in 2026, eight years apart, the same two words. Keep both in your head, guys, cuz later on you're going to see why the second one isn't the verdict people think it is. Now, back to the lawsuit.

On the 11th of September 2018, Ripple and R3 announced that they'd settled everything. The terms were actually confidential. XRP was trading around 26 cents, about 30 times the price in that option. All right, confidential, but not forever. Papers filed in the SEC's case against Ripple later described an enterprise software firm that was actually exercising an option for 1.04 billion XRP in 2019.

Now, stay with me. Ledger Insights identified that firm as R3 and worked out that XRP was worth at least 240 million dollars at 2019 prices. So, the first thing the paper trail proves is simple. Ripple and R3 weren't secret partners. Their deal was public.

It fell apart. And they spent a year in court fighting over XRP. Now, here's a confession. There was a time I'd see a headline with R3 or of Swift in it. I'd see XRP somewhere nearby and I would join the dots myself.

For like being early or actually help me was learning to ask one question. Who said it and where's the original? Asking that question properly is exactly what we work through together on a call, right? And that is the link I'm talking about down below. Taking a story like this one, checking what's really behind it and deciding what it means for your XRP you hold, if anything at all, to get one set up, all you got to do guys is open the description, click the link and you're going to go straight through to the free training.

Then there's a button that's going to take you to a quick questionnaire that takes about a minute to fill in. Literally that is it. After that, if you want to speak to someone, you can speak and you can go ahead. If you're on your phone, just hit the more button, you're going to see the link pop up. All right, get it booked guys.

I'm going to keep talking through this video while you're figuring that out or pause it and come back. So here's why it gets strange for me. Less than 3 months after that settlement, on the 5th of December 2018, our free launched an app called Corda Settler. It actually lets deals on our free's platform get paid in outside the payment systems. So the first cryptocurrency it supported was XRP, all right?

10, on the 13th 2019, Swiss chief executive went on CNBC at the Paris Fintech Forum. Garlinghouse was on the same CNBC panel and Librand actually made an announcement. Check this.

extremely interoperable and and open and we've always had links to other networks. We're going to enhance that with API access. Um we are uh announcing I think later today a proof of concept with R3 and R3 blockchain on trade where you can initiate a payment on the trade platform and then it goes into into GPI. Um so we are we're exploring interconnectivity with a lot of things.

A proof of concept between Swift and R3. And R3's payment app had just launched with XRP. Now you can imagine what happened next. The post wrote themselves, Swift is going to use XRP through R3. Then they actually brought up XRP himself.

Here's what he said. Check this out.

Maybe to that, I mean a big part of the of the value proposition of Ripple I think is the cryptocurrency, the XRP. Um I think that's another one worthy of the Um there we do find that the banks are also, at least when they talk to us, they may tell you different things. They are hesitant to to convert things into a currency a cryptocurrency right now because of the the volatility in the currencies, because of the fact that you don't have the deep liquidity that you have in for example the dollar as a clearing as a clearing unit at the end of the day. So again, when we again engage banks, they we don't find them ready for a model where you convert it into crypto and then convert it back.

Banks not ready to convert into crypto and back. And calling house sitting right there actually came straight back at him. All right, watch this next one.

It's not really a separate debate because I think there's two important things about this and Gottfried mentioned this earlier. Swift today is a one-way messaging framework. It actually isn't a liquidity provider, right? It's Swift messaging partner with bank liquidity. When we think about an internet of value, it's a mixture of two-way messaging frameworks and then moving to real-time a chatty protocol if you will, coupled with real-time liquidity.

Messaging on one side, money on the other. It's the same argument as the Ferrari post. Now, what about the rumor that Swift was going to settle in XRP through Afri's app? Well, in February 2019, Afri's chief executive David Rutter was asked exactly that question. He said it was not all of his understanding and called it a misinterpretation of what had happened.

Now, a few months later he explained how his app actually connects. Listen for which network he names here.

We built this thing called the quarter of settlers so that assets that trade on the quarter network can be settled through other means. And if our customers want to use Libra coins, they can. If they want to use another means of settling it, they can as well. And importantly, we've already linked to the Swift GPI network, which of course is a is the current rail that large enterprise transactions would be settled on.

Settle through other means. XRP was one option. All right, so Facebook's Libra actually could have been another. And Swift GPI was another. That's what a socket is.

Lots of things can plug in into it isn't a merger. That's the second thing the paper trail proves. XRP and Swift, their Swift GPI, are both connected to the same R3 app. Swift side is a trial, but when the people involved spoke about whether Swift was using XRP, the answer was no, or not as far as they knew. In early 2020, Swift hired a new Chief Innovation Officer, and it was called Tom.

All right, for the next 6 years, he helped lead its work on digital assets, central bank digital currencies, and moving tokens between blockchains. On the 29th September 2025, Swift actually made the announcement it was adding a blockchain-based ledger to its infrastructure, starting with real-time, around-the-clock cross-border payments. More than 30 financial institutions from 16 countries were involved, including Bank of America, Citi, HSBC, JP Morgan, all right, all of them. Here's how Swift describes it in his own video. Listen to what the ledger they say is for.

We're adding a blockchain-based shared ledger to our technology infrastructure to meet the needs of the evolving finance industry. The Swift ledger will open up more dynamic landscape where coordinated, real-time value exchange across emerging digital ecosystems is essential, but without fragmenting liquidity or compromising trust. Built on distributed ledger technology, it will provide participating institutions with a trusted view of what banks owe each other [music] and a clear picture of their funded payment commitments. We're working with over 40 financial institutions to design and develop the ledger, focusing on 24/7, always-on cross-border payments.

A trusted view of what banks owe each other and their funded payment commitments. Now, in plain English, Swift wants its network to show not just the message, but the money committed behind it. Now, go back to 2018. Messaging is still not tied to the settlement. That was Garlinghouse's complaint, right?

Swift hasn't said Ripple was right, but what it has built is actually aimed at the exact complaint. So, is XRP on it? No. Swift spells out who is. Check this out.

done several things to support trust in the shared ledger. Firstly, participation will only be permitted by regulated institutions. It will only be given to verified entities [music] and the access will be controlled. Secondly, there'll be clear rules governing commitments and settlement [music] and shared governance across institutions. Swift will not issue money, take custody of funds, or [music] act as settlement agent or financial market infrastructure.

Regulated institutions only, access controlled, and Swift won't issue any money of its own. Now, that's a private network for banks. There's no public coin like XRP on it. It's the opposite of the XRP ledger where anyone can actually open an account and then simply hold XRP. In April 2026, Zach actually left Swift and in July when that post about Swift supporting XRP went round, he answered with two words from the start.

Now, this was days earlier. A crypto podcast had posted an interview with him and it was about why they were replacing Swift story that was always flawed and why in his view the real bottleneck isn't settlement. It's trust. So, when you put it all together, not happening is accurate. As far as it goes, Swift isn't secretly running on XRP.

Now, if that's what you were sold, the paper trail says it was never true. But that was never the only way that Ripple could win. That's the important part. All right, so now let's flip the trailer round and look at it from Ripple's end. In October 2025, Ripple announced it was buying a treasury software company called G Treasury for about a billion dollars.

Big companies use that kind of software to run their cash and also payments. Now, G Treasury was already a certified Swift partner, so it could send and receive Swift messages. Now, it's still listed in Swift partner directory under that name, separately under Ripple. The platform has added XRP and Ripple's own stable coin. Now, think about what that means.

Ripple isn't inside Swift, its treasury business is a certified partner that connects to Swift. The company whose boss once compared Swift's upgrade to a Model T engine now plugs into Swift network. That's not a takeover in either direction, it's two systems that have to deal with each other. All right, now there's the document that I promised you. On the 18th of August 2026, Jeonbuk Bank of South Korea became the first regional bank in the country to use Ripple payments for money going abroad.

Now that's with settlement inside stablecoins. All right, read Ripple's own announcement. It says traditional transfers pass through several middleman banks on the Swift network. Now that can take days. With Ripple payments it actually says they complete in seconds to minutes around the clock.

That's the real shape of it. It's not Swift switching over to XRP one morning, right? One bank, one set of payments at a time. Choosing Ripple's route because it's actually faster. And notice in this case the settlement runs on stablecoins, not XRP.

So for XRP holders, the honest question is not whether banks will just use Ripple. They already do. It's how much of that flow ends up going through XRP. That's how the Bloomberg questions from 2018. Now who's coming on board gets answered very very slowly in documents like this one with a bank's name on them.

So I want to hear from you. When you first got into XRP, what did you think the Swift story was? That XRP would obviously replace Swift, right? Work inside it or run alongside it. That's probably what you got told.

Now answer underneath this video in the comments and say if your view has shifted after what I've told you. And there was a lot of information in this video, but that's the whole point, give you the receipts. Here's the verdict, document by document. One, Ripple and R3 were not hidden allies. Their deal was public, they sued each other over XRP and settled in private.

According to the Ledger Insights, R3 ended up with about a billion XRP. Now two, XRP and Swift did end up near each other. Corda Settler support XRP and Swift tested a link with R3. But when the people involved spoke about it, R3's boss in 2019 and Swift's former innovation chief in 2026, the answer was no. All right, so they knew as far as they knew.

Now number three, Swift went from blockchain is further out to rolling its own blockchain ledger. It's private, it's for banks, and there's no public coin like XRP on it. It goes after the problem Ripple spent years pointing at, but on Swift's terms, okay? Now number four, Ripple's real case isn't a secret Swift switch. It's banks like Jeonbuk choosing Ripple's route for particular payments in public, in writing.

Now how much of that runs through XRP is the number to watch. So, the two words from Bloomberg in 2018 and from Swift's simple former innovation chief in 2026 are answering different questions. Swift putting XRP inside its network, not happening. Banks using Ripple's rails next to Swift, well, that's already in the documents. So, if you'd like seeing the originals instead of the rumors, you know where to tune in, guys.

Subscribe here. The next trail will land in your feed. All right? As always, stay bullish. Oh.

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