While everyone was talking about Bitcoin a month ago and its price skyrocketed to meteoric levels, now, investors’ eyes are turning to Ripple (XRP). The cryptocurrency has grown to around $4.00, while it was around 20 cents just two months ago. Such an increase has shifted the focus from Bitcoin to Ripple, especially after Ripple became the second largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization.
The co-founder of Ripple, Chris Larsen, is now officially one of the world’s richest people. Estimations by press suggest that if he sells his position in the company and his own Ripple coins, then his wealth would amass to around $60 billion. According to Techspot, that would place him on the Forbes 400 as the fifth richest person in the world falling behind Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Mark Zuckerberg.
Owning 17% stake in the company Ripple, Larsen is mainly involved in working with banks and institutions to process payments and transactions on an international level in an efficient and timely manner.
As with most cryptocurrencies, the value of Ripple is nowhere near stable, with the price fluctuating between $3.00 – $3.50. The rapid rise of Chris Larsen to one of the richest people on earth for such a short amount of time speaks volumes about the power of digital currencies.
Currently, the market cap of the total cryptocurrency market is approximately $760 billion and some analysts expect this amount to go up to $1 trillion in 2018 alone. However, with the opposition of banks and governments, both the rise and fall of the digital currency market are possible.