Ripple's Chief Legal Officer, Stuart Alderoty, declared that crypto is becoming a standard part of American finance, pointing to a new National Cryptocurrency Association (NCA) report revealing that 67 million Americans now own or use digital assets. Speaking at the NYSE on May 28, Alderoty, who also serves as NCA president, emphasized that adoption is increasingly about integrating crypto into everyday payments, investing, custody, and treasury infrastructure rather than building a separate financial system.
Alderoty described Ripple as a "one-stop shop" for enterprises, providing crypto infrastructure to large and medium-sized businesses for payments, custody, tokenization, and liquidity management. He highlighted the NCA's State of Crypto Holder Report, conducted with Harris Poll among 40,000 Americans, showing 12 million new holders entering the crypto economy in the past year. The growth is demographically broad, spanning women, construction workers, and manufacturing employees, not just traditional tech hubs.
Meanwhile, Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse directly tied XRP's long-term growth to the CLARITY Act, a proposed bill that would establish clear, permanent regulatory standards for digital assets. Following President Trump's pledge to build a "future-proof" digital asset framework, Garlinghouse stated that the "Anti-Crypto Army" has been defeated by courts, voters, and the current administration, and that only legislation can end the enforcement-driven approach. The act would remove cross-border payment assets from traditional SEC enforcement, giving conservative financial institutions the legal certainty needed to adopt blockchain-based liquidity solutions and tokenized products.
Alderoty compared the shift to the smartphone transition, where digital assets will become an invisible funding source inside apps like OnePay at Walmart checkout. The NCA report also showed that 18% of new holders are 18–24 years old, while 28% are over 55, signaling generational crossover. At press time, XRP traded at $1.32, with its future valuation potentially hinging on whether the CLARITY Act passes the Senate and drives institutional bank adoption.
