- Blockchain-based payments venture is girding for spike in business.
- CEO Brad Garlinghouse said Donald Trump is stimulating bullish activity in crypto.
- Other crypto outfits are also beefing up their ranks as optimism surges.
Ripple, the blockchain venture specialising in cross-border payments, is ramping up deals and kicking off a hiring spree.
The reason?
A big bet that President-elect Donald Trump will usher in a boom for crypto after he takes office on January 20.
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse said on X that the crypto company had done more business stateside in the last six weeks of 2024 than in the previous six months. A Ripple spokesperson declined to provide details on the deals.
The company has added almost a dozen new roles in the US since October, according to its website. Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency used on its blockchain, XRP, has climbed more than 10% in the last seven days compared to a 3% hike in Bitcoin.
“Say what you want, but the ‘Trump effect’ is already making crypto great again,” Garlinghouse tweeted.
Robinhood hires
Ripple isn’t the only firm filling crypto roles in the US.
Robinhood, the listed online broker, is hiring a compliance lead, content manager, and web developer for its crypto division in the US.
Andreessen Horowitz, the Silicon Valley VC firm, is adding two crypto event managers to its San Francisco and New York City offices.
At the same time, Consensys, the blockchain firm behind the popular crypto wallet MetaMask and layer 2 network Linea, is hiring nine new “tier-1 strategic roles” across the United States, said a spokesperson.
These roles will help Consensys expand its crypto payments, developer tooling, and decentralised identity services, Leona Semmens, the company’s interim chief people officer, told DL News.
Relaxed regulations
Since Trump won the US presidential election in November, the crypto industry has been optimistic that he will usher in a relaxed regulatory climate in contrast to the clampdown under President Joe Biden and his hard-charging financial watchdog, Gary Gensler.
Under Gensler, the US Securities and Exchange Commission pursued litigation against Ripple, Coinbase, Kraken, Binance, and other crypto ventures. The regulator’s main beef: crypto exchanges and issuers should comply with the same rules as traditional securities firms.
With Gensler packing up, Trump has nominated Paul Atkins, a former SEC commissioner who embraces crypto.
Atkins’ consulting firm, Patomak, has links to several crypto companies, including FalconX and the Digital Chamber of Commerce, an industry lobbying group.
Tether’s ally
Trump’s pick for Secretary of Commerce, Howard Lutnick, is also a big crypto ally. Lutnick is the CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald, a financial services firm that invested in Tether and helped the stablecoin issuer manage its mammoth reserves.
Trump also appointed PayPal co-founder David Sacks to a new, bespoke “AI and crypto czar” role.
Meanwhile, the crypto market resumed its rally after a lull over the holidays.
On Monday, Bitcoin recrossed the $100,000 threshold, and the total crypto market value is up 9% in the first week of 2025, to $3.7 trillion, according to CoinGecko.
XRP, now worth $135 billion, is the fourth most valuable cryptocurrency.
Liam Kelly is a Berlin-based reporter for DL News. Got a tip? Email him at liam@dlnews.com.
