Ripple officially took over Ethereum by $200 mln in market cap to become the world’s second largest cryptocurrency with a total market cap of $8.5 bln. Over a 24-hour period, Ripple price recorded a 71.6 percent increase, while Ethereum price decreased by 6.85 percent.
CoinMarketCap charts show ripple had climbed above ethereum into the second-place spot in May. But back then ripple was only worth about 36 cents.
The digital currency ended 2016 at less than 1 cent and topped $1 only last week, before leaping above $2 Friday afternoon. Ripple is up more than 34,700 percent this year.
Ripple is considered to be the most potent currency among the 100 largest capitalization coins in the world. The ripple network is designed for seamless money transfer over a third party regardless of currency: USD, EUR or bitcoin.
And despite its potential, it is a formidable opponent for all of today's trading methods. But so far Ripple has not become the best method of payment by the Fed. Of the 12,000 banks currently operating cash flow in the world, 11,000 banks use the old SWIFT protocol and 1,000 banks are switching to using the ripple protocol. While many analysts believe that in the future, sooner or later the ripple will also shoot at SWIFT's key position in the global financial markets.
With its partnership with Japan Bank Consortium and other leading banks and financial institutions in Europe such as BBVA, Ripple has solidified its position as the base Blockchain protocol for the global financial structure and industry.