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Tom Zschach, chief innovation officer at Swift, joins the current conversation on X about tokenization.
Zscach is known in the XRP community for his criticism of the cryptocurrency. In prior communications, he compared using a private token as a "bridge currency" to using a fax machine, obviously throwing shade at XRP. Zschach also questioned Ripple's chances of conquering the financial system, claiming that banking institutions would not be using the XRP token.
In a tweet, Zscach stated that "tokenisation isn't a feature upgrade," defining it as "the moment finance stops shuffling claims and starts synchronising truth."
The Swift official was referring to a recent take by BlackRock executives on tokenization. Writing in The Economist, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink and COO Rob Goldstein referred to tokenization as "the next major evolution in market infrastructure."
Swipe at XRP?
While Zscach did not mention XRP in his post, as is his characteristic manner, his prior history with the cryptocurrency might suggest a deeper meaning to his tweet, especially when he said tokenization was not a feature upgrade, but this is unknown.
The Multi-Purpose Token (MPT) upgrade went live on XRP Ledger in October, representing a step forward in how complex financial instruments can be represented on-chain, with tokenization being at the center of XRPL’s institutional strategy.
Over the last year, the XRP Ledger (XRPL) has broken into the top chains for real-world assets (RWAs) as Ripple continues to expand its tokenization focus through various partnerships.
In September, Ripple and Securitize launched a smart contract that would allow holders of BUIDL and VBILL to exchange their shares for Ripple USD (RLUSD) stablecoin.
BlackRock’s USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund (BUIDL) and VanEck’s Treasury Fund, Ltd. (VBILL) are both firms’ first tokenized funds issued on public blockchains. This move provided an additional stablecoin off-ramp for BUIDL and VBILL tokenized short-term treasury funds.
Dan Burgin
Vladislav Sopov
U.Today Editorial Team