XRPL staking debate tests Ripple’s DeFi ambitions and Fed-facing plans

The emerging debate around XRPL staking shows how Ripple may evolve its core payments chain while eyeing new roles in decentralized finance and regulated money markets.

How could staking change the XRP Ledger’s design?

Ripple is weighing whether to add staking to the XRP Ledger (XRPL), a decade-old blockchain optimized for fast, low-cost value transfer.

The idea surfaced after J. Ayo Akinyele, head of engineering at RippleX, published a blog post examining how staking might expand XRP’s utility and reshape incentives for validators and token holders.

Akinyele wrote that the concept emerged naturally as new features roll out across XRPL. Staking, he argued, could support “long-term participation” and improve network security by rewarding entities that help maintain consensus over time. However, any such feature would require deep architectural changes.

Today, the XRPL burns transaction fees to keep XRP’s supply modestly deflationary. Redirecting those same fees to users as staking rewards would demand a fundamental rework of the ledger’s core systems, including how fees are collected, accounted for and redistributed. Moreover, those changes would touch the protocol’s economic model.

The ledger was originally built to move value efficiently, especially for cross-border payments, which have long been its main use case.

As XRP appears in institutional products such as exchange-traded vehicles and gains traction with corporate treasuries, Ripple is considering whether staking and similar features are needed to stay competitive with newer DeFi-first chains.

However, shifting XRPL toward a reward-driven design raises questions about its foundational principles.

The network relies on a Proof of Association-style model that emphasizes trusted validator lists rather than stake-based influence. Introducing strong economic incentives could blur that boundary and force a rethink of how validator selection and accountability work.

What staking models is Ripple considering for XRPL?

Ripple CTO David Schwartz joined the debate by outlining two theoretical models that could bring staking to the XRP Ledger. Both aim to add incentives without abandoning XRPL’s established consensus approach, yet each would require substantial engineering work and community review.

The first concept is a dual-layer consensus structure with an incentivized “inner” layer. In this sketch, roughly 16 validators would form an inner group chosen by the broader validator set according to stake criteria. That inner committee would advance the ledger, while slashing and staking rules would govern their behavior.

Meanwhile, an “outer” layer of validators would retain responsibility for governance and system oversight.

This second layer would monitor the inner group, validate its decisions and manage configuration changes. However, critics worry that concentrating block advancement in a small, stake-chosen set could add new centralization and governance risks.

The second model keeps XRPL’s current consensus but repurposes fees to pay for zero-knowledge proof (ZKP) verification. In such a system, participants would use ZKPs to prove correct behavior or participation without exposing underlying data.

Moreover, that trust-minimized mechanism could allow the network to enforce rewards and penalties without fully adopting stake-based block production.

Because ZK technology is evolving quickly, many details remain open. Questions include how proof generation costs would be shared, how often proofs must be posted and which actors would be eligible to earn rewards from verification fees.

That said, Schwartz emphasized that both models remain conceptual only.

He cautioned that the required structural change, engineering effort and risk analysis mean staking is unlikely to arrive on XRPL soon.

Any move toward a reward-based system would need extensive simulation, security review and community governance. For now, the ideas mainly signal how Ripple is thinking about future validator incentives rather than setting a concrete roadmap.

How does this fit into Ripple’s wider DeFi and policy strategy?

The staking discussion comes as Ripple is expanding its footprint across institutional DeFi, stablecoins and real-world asset tokenization. While on-chain incentives may help deepen liquidity and participation, regulatory access to payment infrastructure is just as crucial to its strategy.

Earlier this month, Ripple’s chief legal officer highlighted a proposal from Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller for so-called “skinny” Fed accounts. Waller suggested granting crypto firms and stablecoin issuers access to streamlined master accounts that would connect them directly to the Fed’s payment rails, as detailed in his Payments Innovation Conference remarks.

Under this concept, companies could settle transactions in central bank money without depending on commercial banks that often hesitate to service digital asset businesses. Waller urged regulators to “embrace the disruption — don’t avoid it,” signalling a more open stance toward decentralized finance and programmable money.

However, practical implementation questions remain.

Ripple previously applied for a Fed master account to support its RLUSD stablecoin. The firm now sees the “skinny” account approach as potentially transformative. Direct access could accelerate settlement, lower operating costs and improve the stability and redeemability of tokenized dollars in the United States.

The proposal also matters for competition in the stablecoin sector, which remains dominated by Tether and Circle.

A Fed-linked model could help RLUSD stand out by enabling fast movement between U.S. Treasuries and dollars without banking intermediaries, as reported by CoinDesk coverage of Waller’s idea. Moreover, it could align on-chain settlement with traditional payment rails.

For Ripple, these policy developments intersect with technical debates like staking on XRPL and ZKP-based verification fees.

A more programmable, incentive-aware XRP Ledger, combined with regulated access to payment systems, would position the company at the nexus of DeFi innovation and mainstream financial infrastructure.

Still, both Waller’s account proposal and the internal ripple staking proposal remain early-stage. Implementation will depend on regulators, elected policymakers, and the XRPL community.

Until then, the conversation around XRPL staking and XRPL proof of association shows how the next phase of XRP Ledger evolution may be shaped as much by incentives and compliance as by code.