The Stellar Development Foundation, a non-profit organization focused on the development of the Stellar network, is reportedly cooperating with global private equity firm Advent International to buy leading money transfer company MoneyGram, according to a Bloomberg report that cites sources with knowledge of the matter.
At this stage, it’s not clear how the acquisition talks will pan out.
Stellar’s rivalry with Ripple
MoneyGram terminated its major partnership with Stellar rival Ripple after the latter was taken to court by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission over its allegedly illegal XRP sales back in December.
As reported by U.Today, the San Francisco-based distributed ledger tech provider then moved to dispose of its entire stake in MoneyGram.
Ironically, Stellar was launched by Ripple co-founder Jed McCaleb in 2014 after he left the company due to a falling-out with other top executives.
McCaleb received 8 billion XRP tokens for his role in creating the OpenCoin company, which has been renamed to Ripple Labs. After he intended to sell the tokens, he ended up entering into a seven-year agreement with Ripple Labs, which precludes the programmer from selling 1.5 percent of XRP's daily volume per day.
Stellar and Ripple, which share many similarities, have been in a wiry rivalry for years, partly due to the drama surrounding their co-founder. The MoneyGram acquisition could further reignite animosity between the two camps.
Other acquisition attempts
Rumors about a potential MoneyGram takeover have been swirling for years. Western Union reportedly made an acquisition bid last year.
Alibaba-owned Ant Group attempted to purchase MoneyGram for $1.2 billion in 2017, but the deal was blocked by U.S. regulators.
Valeria Blokhina
Tomiwabold Olajide
