Ripple price leaps on MoneyGram Alibaba news (XRP BTC)

By Chris Burns/Jan. 11, 2018 11:20 am EST

This morning Ripple announced a partnership with MoneyGram. The two companies will team up to bring XRP technology to payment flows. This move was announced to "allows MoneyGram to solve the age-old liquidity issue most financial institutions face while saving time and money." This announcement came on the heels of a cancellation of a MoneyGram sale to online sales giant Alibaba's Ant Financial.

"MoneyGram will access and use XRP, the native digital asset of the XRP Ledger, in their payment flows through xRapid, Ripple's on-demand liquidity product," said a Ripple representative. The company suggested that xRapid will be able to "unlock liquidity" and access multiple corridors, each from one pre-funded account. That's real-time FX (foreign exchange) settlement unlocked with XRP.

So this could be neat, but remember: the XRP coin represents Ripple, but it's not the same thing. There are multiple facets to this particular piping system, and you're not necessarily going to be able to see one end from the other – so to speak.

Alibaba made an announcement to buy MoneyGram back in April of 2017. They did this to establish a cross-border payment network with the United States as well as other major financial arenas. Just last week, MoneyGram announced that they would not be merging, and instead would "explore and develop initiatives" with Alibaba.

"The geopolitical environment has changed considerably since we first announced the proposed transaction with Ant Financial nearly a year ago," said MoneyGram CEO Alex Holmes. "Despite our best efforts to work cooperatively with the U.S. government, it has now become clear that CFIUS [Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States] will not approve this merger."

As always, none of the above or indeed any cryptocurrency news here on SlashGear should be taken as financial advice. SlashGear takes no responsibility for anything any reader does before, during, or after reading this article – or any part of SlashGear for that matter. Just don't do anything, sit there and freeze!