Uphold Chief Product Officer Paul Underwood has confirmed that the trading platform’s long-awaited “Earn on XRP” feature is in final development and that official details will be shared within weeks. The announcement was made during the XRP Vegas conference and later posted on X, where Underwood acknowledged delays but said, “The wait is almost over.”
The earning product could cover roughly 1.62 billion XRP held by Uphold customers, according to the company’s Proof of Reserves report. That figure equals about 1.63% of XRP’s circulating supply and places Uphold among the top three exchanges by XRP holdings, behind Binance and Upbit. XRP is also the largest asset on Uphold’s platform by market capitalization, with user funds backed 1:1.
Because the XRP Ledger does not support native staking in the same way as proof-of-stake networks such as Ethereum or Solana, Uphold must use alternative yield mechanisms. The company has pointed to possible routes including DeFi lending protocols such as Exactly Protocol and wrapped token solutions through its partner Flare Network. Uphold has not yet confirmed the exact mechanism, providers, custody arrangements, liquidity terms, counterparty risks, or smart-contract risks.
The exchange is also working to obtain New York’s strict BitLicense, signaling that the Earn product is being prepared under U.S. regulatory oversight. The move is strategic: Uphold has positioned itself as a major hub for the XRP community, already offering U.S. debit cards with up to 6% cashback in XRP and bonuses of up to 3% on recurring purchases. The upcoming Earn program is intended to let long-term XRP investors generate returns within a regulated platform rather than moving assets to third-party DeFi services. Underwood said interest rates, regional availability, withdrawal conditions, fees, and other terms will be disclosed in the coming weeks.
