Japan's Rakuten Group has launched a significant integration of XRP into its Rakuten Pay and Rakuten Wallet applications, potentially exposing the cryptocurrency to tens of millions of mainstream users. The integration allows users to convert Rakuten's massive loyalty points system—valued at roughly $23 billion—directly into XRP, bypassing the need for a traditional exchange account.
The announcement, confirmed on April 15, 2026, pushed the price of XRP to $1.38, elevating its market capitalization above $84 billion. Trading volume was reported at $2.4 billion over the preceding 24 hours, though this represented a 25% decline from the prior period.
The scale of the integration is vast. Approximately 44 million Rakuten Wallet users can now hold XRP, purchase it with loyalty points, and fund their Rakuten Cash balances to spend at over 5 million merchant locations across Japan, both online and in physical stores. Users can also spot trade XRP directly within the app. XRP joins Bitcoin, Ether, and Bitcoin Cash, which were added in earlier phases.
Tatsuya Kohrogi, Ripple's senior ecosystem growth manager, hailed the move as "one of the most significant milestones for XRP," emphasizing that Rakuten Pay is a mainstream commerce app, not a product built for crypto enthusiasts. This places XRP in front of a massive audience that may have never previously interacted with digital currency.
This integration marks a strategic shift for XRP, which has long been associated with institutional cross-border payments, into the realm of retail point-of-sale spending. Analysts view the potential as real but conditional, noting that the critical question is whether everyday shoppers will choose to pay with XRP or default to traditional yen-based payment methods they already trust.
In a parallel development, a survey released by Nomura and Laser Digital on April 16, 2026, highlights challenges for Ripple's upcoming dollar-pegged stablecoin, RLUSD, in the same market. The survey of 518 Japanese investment professionals found that 63% see potential uses for stablecoins. However, stablecoins issued by major financial institutions garnered the highest institutional trust, while crypto-native issuers ranked the lowest.
This presents a hurdle for RLUSD, which Ripple and its long-time partner SBI Holdings planned to distribute in Japan via SBI VC Trade. Japan's regulatory framework limits the issuance of certain stablecoins to banks, fund transfer service providers, and trust companies, concentrating credibility around supervised financial entities like Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), Mizuho Bank, and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), which are already developing their own stablecoins.
The survey suggests RLUSD's strongest potential lies in cross-border payments and exchange liquidity—areas where Ripple's existing infrastructure is strong—but it may face significant competition and trust barriers in higher-value institutional use cases like treasury management and domestic corporate payments.
