Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse criticized Bitcoin for its limitations in making payments, calling the cryptocurrency XRP more suitable for international transactions.
According to Garlinghouse, Bitcoin cannot meet the growing demand of the global population for secure payments — excessive fees in the Bitcoin blockchain will prevent it from becoming a leader in international financial transfers. As Garlinghouse expressed, $XRP arose because programmers, aware of Bitcoin's problems, created a more advanced network. Ripple's solution processes payments 1000 times faster and cheaper than Bitcoin, making it better suited for the modern financial sector, claims Garlinghouse.
Ripple aims to ensure that companies do not have to pre-fund accounts for cross-border payments. The current banking system uses correspondent accounts where funds are frozen. This causes delays in money transfers, which are often intended for individuals or small groups of people.
As an example, Garlinghouse cited a freelancer living in the Philippines and working for a London company. He often struggles to receive foreign transfers due to systemic banking restrictions. Ripple allows for instant payments without the need to make transactions in large amounts.
Garlinghouse compared Ripple's mission to the emergence of early internet protocols TCP/IP and HTTP. The company aims to do the same in the payment sector, creating a solution that allows money to move as easily as internet data. Given that the coin $XRP does not need to be mined, the Ripple blockchain can handle more transactions and consume much less electricity than Bitcoin, which uses the Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus method, concluded Garlinghouse.
Previously, the head of Ripple stated that the traditional banking system is already outdated, and therefore it needs to be modernized with the help of cryptocurrencies to increase the speed of settlements and make them cheaper.
