In the cryptocurrency world, many investors often liken XRP and Stellar to 'twin siblings' – both originated from blockchain foundations and aim at the international payment market, serving banks, money transfer companies, and financial institutions.

However, when considering three crucial factors: capital – legal compliance – and growth momentum, XRP is outperforming Stellar. Below is a detailed analysis.

1. Deeper Liquidity – Major Advantage of XRP

Financial institutions hold enormous amounts of capital, and they only choose networks with 'doors' wide enough to trade quickly without causing significant price volatility.

  • XRP's market capitalization: approximately $194 billion, with daily trading volume exceeding $12 billion.

  • Stellar's market capitalization: only $14 billion, with daily trading volume around $1 billion.

This gap provides XRP with three significant benefits:

  1. Investors can easily buy/sell large amounts without worrying about significant 'slippage'.

  2. Ensures organizations that there are always enough trading partners.

  3. Supports the building of complex financial products (derivatives, securitization…) thanks to good hedging capabilities of market makers.

Conclusion: Liquidity creates liquidity. As the XRP ecosystem continues to expand, this advantage will increase, attracting more institutional capital.

A payment network only exists if it strictly meets regulatory requirements.

XRPL (XRP Ledger) pre-integrated:

  • Trust-line Authorization: authenticates trust between wallets.

  • Account Freeze: freezes suspicious accounts.

  • Deep Freeze: completely locks the wallet at the protocol level.

As a result, banks can meet KYC/AML (anti-money laundering) standards directly within the system, without the need for external solutions.

Conversely, Stellar could also apply similar rules, but relies heavily on on/off-ramp providers to operate its compliance servers. This complicates the process and involves many third parties.

This is clearly demonstrated through partnership deals:

  • Ripple & HSBC (2025): launching tokenized securities custody service, directly leveraging XRPL's compliance tools.

  • Circle (June 2025): issuing USDC stablecoin on XRPL, immediately increasing liquidity for USD on-chain transactions.

Meanwhile, Stellar continues to collaborate with major names like MoneyGram, but the scale and liquidity potential are not comparable.

3. Clearer Growth Momentum

XRP possesses a positive news 'pipeline' that Stellar lacks:

  • 95% chance of XRP spot ETF being approved in the US before the end of 2025 – opening the door for retirement and institutional capital flow through fund products.

  • Real World Asset (RWA) tokenization on XRPL: has surpassed $179 million, a 52% increase in just 30 days, with experimental projects ranging from US Treasury bonds to corporate bonds.

Meanwhile, Stellar, despite holding a larger total RWA value ($451 million), has seen almost no growth in the past 30 days, indicating a lack of new momentum to attract capital.

Conclusion

When combining three factors: liquidity – compliance – growth momentum, XRP has a distinct advantage:

  • Liquidity many times greater than Stellar.

  • Legal compliance tools friendly to banks and large institutions.

  • A boost from ETFs and strategic partners is coming soon.

While Stellar remains focused on remittances and consumer payments, XRP has stepped into the institutional arena with billion-dollar contracts. If the goal is to find projects with the potential to lead the blockchain payment market in the near future, XRP is the more promising choice.