Ripple's US dollar-backed stablecoin RLUSD has set a new record, overtaking PayPal USD (PYUSD) in market capitalization and cementing its position among the leading stablecoins in the global crypto market.

According to recent data from CoinGecko, RLUSD's market capitalization has grown to approximately $2.71 billion, edging past PayPal's stablecoin, which stands at around $2.69 billion. The margin between the two tokens amounts to roughly $20 million — a slim gap in a market where capitalization rankings are widely used to gauge the relative scale of dollar-backed stablecoins. The milestone was reached less than two years after Ripple formally introduced RLUSD in December 2024, underscoring the token's rapid growth in the crypto market.

Validator Highlights RLUSD's Growing Role

Vet, a prominent XRP Ledger validator, commented on the development to underscore the increasing significance of RLUSD in the stablecoin industry.

"$RLUSD is now a Top 5 USD backed stablecoin. On its way to be in Top 3," Vet commented.

Vet noted Ripple's long-standing contribution to building the XRP Ledger, adding that the growing adoption of RLUSD could potentially lead to faster adoption of the blockchain by traditional financial institutions. He stressed the increasing relevance of RLUSD's rising payment volume and the stablecoin's expanded use on the XRP Ledger.

According to Vet, RLUSD has also opened the door to numerous integrations with banks and crypto exchanges. These integrations, he noted, could motivate financial institutions to not only run infrastructure to support the XRP Ledger but also to integrate other tokenized assets on it.

Institutional Use Expands

The new record for RLUSD comes on the back of several key institutional partnerships and exchange integrations that Ripple has announced recently.

On Oct. 28, Ripple announced a partnership with Coinbase to provide RLUSD to both retail and institutional users across Coinbase Exchange, Coinbase Prime, and the exchange's retail trading app. As part of the partnership, Coinbase also announced support for RLUSD across multiple blockchain networks, including the XRP Ledger, Ethereum, and Base. Multi-network availability of this kind broadens a stablecoin's reach across the trading venues and payment channels where dollar-backed tokens circulate.

Separately, Ripple's partnership with banking giant BNY, which serves as the custodian of reserves for RLUSD, continues to deepen. Ripple has also secured support from Standard Chartered, which launched institutional custody services for RLUSD on the XRP Ledger in October. Reserve custody with established banks is a core component of the infrastructure behind dollar-backed stablecoins, making these arrangements a central piece of RLUSD's institutional design. How the narrow gap between RLUSD and PYUSD evolves from here will be visible in the same market capitalization data that recorded the milestone.

Source: CryptoNewsNet | Originally reported by U.Today