SBI Group’s new tie-up with Chainlink has ignited a debate inside the XRP community: is Ripple’s long-standing beachhead in Japan at risk, or is SBI building a broader stack that still leans on XRP for settlement? The partnership, announced over the weekend, will see Chainlink’s interoperability and data infrastructure deployed for financial-market use cases in Japan first and then across Asia-Pacific, including tokenized funds, regulated stablecoins and payment-versus-payment (PvP) foreign-exchange workflows.
The contours of the deal are explicit: SBI says it will leverage Chainlink’s Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP) to move messages and assets across networks; use Chainlink’s data tooling to bring fund net asset value (NAV) data on-chain for tokenized funds; and apply Chainlink’s Proof of Reserve to verify that stablecoins are fully backed. In parallel, SBI continues a flurry of digital-asset initiatives, including separate agreements with Ripple and Circle last week.
“But here’s the key: Chainlink doesn’t provide liquidity. It can route trades. It can prove reserves. It can sync data across chains. But when it comes to actually settling value? That’s not Chainlink’s role.” In his view, the SBI partnership plugs Chainlink into the orchestration layer—governing cross-chain messages, validating collateral and standardizing data—without supplanting the asset that actually bridges currency pairs in production remittances.
On the scope of the new collaboration, the pundit calls it “big league infrastructure,” listing the focus areas as “Tokenized funds & real-world assets (real estate, bonds), Regulated stablecoins, FX settlement with Payment-vs-Payment (PvP), [and] Liquidity + compliance rails for institutions.” He then itemizes what Chainlink brings to that stack: “CCIP → Cross-chain interoperability & messaging,” “SmartData (NAV) → Fund pricing / data oracles,” and “Proof of Reserve → Audits + compliance.” In a single line summary: “Translation: Chainlink handles the instructions and data.”
Where many in the community framed the announcement as an either-or decision for SBI, he pushes back. “This is where Ripple + XRP stay critical.” He contends that XRP is the piece that “bridges currencies where tokenized cash isn’t available,” while Ripple—through its software, partnerships and operational rails—serves as “the liquidity muscle.” That is a direct rejoinder to the “threat” framing, arguing complementarity rather than substitution.
His most quotable shorthand crystallizes the architecture he believes SBI is building: “Think of it like this: Chainlink = Control Layer (messaging, compliance, data), Ripple/XRP = Settlement Layer (bridging money across borders), SBI = The Integrator combining both into one financial stack.” The assignment of roles is intentionally modular: Chainlink to secure and move instructions across chains; Ripple/XRP to move value across markets; SBI to integrate and choose the optimal rail per corridor and instrument.
That leads to his headline conclusion. “So does this threaten Ripple? No. It expands the rails.” In his words, “SBI is hedging smartly — building a multi-rail system. That way tokenized FX, stablecoins, and RWAs on Chainlink rails… …can still settle in XRP when needed. SBI isn’t choosing Chainlink over Ripple. They’re choosing both. Because the future of finance isn’t one-rail. It’s interoperability + liquidity. And that puts XRP in the perfect spot to settle everything.”
At press time, XRP traded at $2.92.
