XRP has always been at the heart of how value moves on the network. It was designed to solve something more fundamental — how money and liquidity move across the global financial system.
Over the years, XRP’s role has expanded from powering payments to providing liquidity, settling tokenized assets, and enabling real-time movement of value across markets. It’s now positioned to play a central role as institutional markets evolve, from digitally asset-backed Treasury securities (DATS) to digital exchange-traded funds (ETFs). Last week marks another milestone with the launch of the first XRP ETF from Canary, a sign of how XRP’s use cases continue to expand while staying true to its original purpose.
All of this is built on XRP’s reliable and decentralized foundation, trusted for more than a decade.
When I think about how XRP’s utility could keep expanding alongside new capabilities, a question naturally comes up:
- What if the XRP Ledger (XRPL) supported native staking?
- What would that mean for network design and the asset itself?
Why the idea is interesting
In most blockchain networks, staking is used to align incentives among validators and token holders. It encourages long-term participation and can strengthen security by rewarding those who help maintain consensus. For holders, these models can offer a more direct way to participate in network governance, though they can also introduce new complexities around fairness and distribution.
On the XRPL, the concept matters because it would challenge long-standing design principles, like the fact that transaction fees are destroyed rather than redistributed, and that validator trust is earned through consistent performance, not financial stake.
Looking at those differences helps clarify how incentives influence network behavior, and it raises some important design questions for the future:
- How should participation evolve as programmability and new financial use cases emerge?
- What models reinforce fairness and decentralization without unnecessary complexity?
- And how might XRP’s role continue to expand as a bridge asset for liquidity and tokenized value?
Exploring these kinds of questions helps ensure the network and XRP’s role within it continues to evolve responsibly as the ecosystem grows.
What native staking would require
For XRP native staking to exist, two things would be essential: first, a source of staking rewards, and second, a way to distribute them fairly.
Today, transaction fees are burned, a deliberate design choice that keeps supply deflationary and helps maintain network efficiency. Introducing staking would mean rethinking how value circulates through the system, and identifying a sustainable way to reward participation. For example, new fees associated with programmability features would be sent to a rewards pool.
Distribution would also require careful design. Staking changes how validators and participants interact, introducing financial incentives that can strengthen engagement but also reshape governance dynamics in subtle ways. Getting those incentives right and corresponding penalties are critical to maintaining the network’s fairness and resilience.
These kinds of trade-offs make staking an interesting thought experiment, but it's not a simple addition.
Why XRP’s network design still works
The real question isn’t how big the rewards might be, but how they’d fit into XRP’s network design. The consensus model – Proof of Association – works a bit differently from most networks. It prioritizes trust and stability over financial incentives. Validators take part because they care about the health of the network. This approach has kept it stable for real financial use cases and trusted by institutions.
We are also seeing organic experimentation with staking and yield programs from exchanges and DeFi protocols like Uphold/Flare, Doppler Finance, Axelar and MoreMarkets, showing that the community is finding ways to engage with XRP within its existing design. It’s a reminder that innovation around utility doesn’t always require core design changes.
Whether or not native staking ever belongs on the network, exploring the idea reinforces the fact that XRP’s purpose isn’t singular or static.
As the ecosystem grows, conversations about incentive models, fairness, and governance help ensure that XRP continues to serve as a connective asset in open, efficient financial systems.
Exploring staking isn’t just about introducing new incentives; it’s about understanding how design choices shape resilience and trust in decentralized systems.
Good network design is about knowing how each new idea fits, and what’s worth preserving as the network grows.
Thinking through ideas like native staking helps clarify where and how XRP’s current model works and what principles must endure as new layers of functionality on the network take shape.
I’m looking forward to continuing the dialogue on how models like staking could shape XRP’s next chapter, and I’d love to hear others’ perspectives
(@ja_akinyele on X).
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