At Ripple's Swell 2025 conference in New York, Maxwell Stein of BlackRock's digital assets team delivered a keynote that electrified the XRP community. Stein asserted that "the market is ready for large-scale blockchain adoption" and projected that Ripple's technology could soon move trillions of dollars on-chain, marking a pivotal moment for institutional validation.
He credited Ripple for proving blockchain's real-world utility, stating, "They’ve already tokenized fixed income, bonds, stablecoins… that’s where it started. But this is the rails for trillions in capital flows." This endorsement highlighted a shift in traditional finance's view of blockchain from an experiment to an emerging standard, with Stein emphasizing the fading separation between traditional and tokenized assets.
However, Australian lawyer Bill Morgan injected caution, questioning whether Stein's remarks reflected BlackRock's official position or personal opinion, underscoring the need for clarity in institutional signals. Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman reinforced this, noting that while the digital asset market is maturing, regulatory clarity remains essential for full-scale institutional engagement, with banks already testing tokenized bonds and stablecoins.
Despite the optimistic tone and Ripple's expanding institutional partnerships, XRP's price performance lagged, trading at $2.21 with a 4% decline over 24 hours at the time of reporting, illustrating the disconnect between market sentiment and immediate price action.
BTC
JUP
SOL
BNB
ADA