Axelar will be the exclusive cross-chain protocol of the new XRP Ledger sidechain

What’s new? The XRP Ledger blockchain team, which is the developer of the Ripple payment protocol and the XRP token, will launch an Ethereum virtual machine (EVM)-enabled sidechain called XRPL EVM. The XRPL EVM’s exclusive cross-chain protocol will be Axelar and will allow users to exchange XRP tokens for “wrapped” eXRP tokens used to pay transaction fees in the sidechain.

Material by The Block

What else is known? Ripple said that using Axelar will simplify the user experience and improve security. The company praised Axelar’s merits, including its integration with leading decentralized crypto exchange (DEX) Uniswap and Microsoft.

For instance, last July, Axelar joined Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform and became the first cross-chain protocol to be introduced to the online developer store. In March this year, the AXL native token was listed on Binance and is now ranked 152nd in the cryptocurrency rankings with a capitalization of $532,7 million.

By switching to Axelar, Ripple will abandon the use of its own XLS-38 bridge. The company explained that using two different cross-chain protocols to transfer funds between networks (XLS-38 for XRP and Axelar for other tokens) would become difficult for users.

In February, Ripple began using Axelar’s GMP engine with support for more than 55 networks to enhance XRPL interoperability for real-world tokenized asset (RWA) transactions.

The announcement of the sidechain launch follows right after Ripple announced the launch of a 1 billion XRP fund to support developers in the XRP Ledger ecosystem from Korea and Japan. Two months ago, Ripple also announced the release of a dollar-pegged stablecoin on the XRP Ledger and Ethereum blockchains.

This week, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said the new asset will be given the ticker RLUSD, which stands for “Real USD.”

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Also in preparation for the launch of the stablecoin, Ripple bought New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) regulated institutional digital asset storage platform Standard Custody. Standard Custody CEO Jack McDonald has been appointed as head of Ripple’s stablecoin division.

Last month, Paolo Ardoino, the head of Tether, which issues USDT, the largest stablecoin in the crypto market with a capitalization of $112,7 billion, accused Garlinghouse of attacking his company. Thus, Garlinghouse said about the “clear” harassment of Tether by the US authorities, and Arduino noted that the statement was made in anticipation of the release of a competing stablecoin.