In this article4 sections
Ripple Prime, the institutional brokerage arm of crypto payments firm Ripple, has become a meaningful provider of swap financing for leveraged exchange-traded funds, taking on a role that has usually belonged to large banks and securities firms. The first details came from a Wall Street Journal report on Oct. 7 and were covered on Oct. 8 by Coinpedia, which described ETF expert Nate Geraci calling Ripple a serious player in swap financing for leveraged ETFs.
Under these arrangements, a leveraged fund uses derivatives to obtain exposure to a stock or index without buying the equivalent amount of shares. The fund pays a financing cost on that exposure, and the counterparty supplying it collects a fee. Ripple Prime sits on the financing side of those trades.
Also readRipple Prime to Provide Brokerage Services to $35B Brevan Howard Funds
Key facts
- The Tradr 2X Long SNDK Daily ETF pays Ripple an annualized financing rate of about 8%, calculated as the overnight bank funding rate plus four percentage points, separate from the ETF’s management fee.
- Morningstar Direct data cited by both Coinpedia and U.today places 593 leveraged ETFs in the U.S. with more than $256 billion in assets, including 426 tied to individual stocks.
- Ripple Prime President Noel Kimmel said the business is becoming an important part of the company, describing it as a growing and meaningful part of the firm’s operations.
- The first 3X leveraged Bitcoin and Ether ETPs began trading on Cboe BZX after receiving SEC approval, using CME futures and swaps rather than holding the tokens directly.
- On Oct. 6, hedge fund manager Brevan Howard, with roughly $35 billion in assets, agreed to use Ripple Prime for brokerage, clearing and financing across traditional and digital markets.
Coinpedia reported that Ripple Prime holds more than $1 billion in regulatory net capital and raised $275 million through a senior debt offering to fund its growth. Crypto.news added that the raise came in August through a private placement of senior unsecured notes, with KBRA assigning a BBB investment grade rating and Piper Sandler serving as lead placement agent; Ripple did not disclose the notes’ maturity, interest rate or participating investors.
How Ripple built the business
The financing operation rests on Ripple’s $1.25 billion acquisition of prime broker Hidden Road, announced in April 2025 and completed that October, when the firm was rebranded Ripple Prime. Crypto.news reported that the acquired business had handled roughly $3 trillion in annual clearing activity and grew about threefold after the deal was announced. In August 2026, Ripple Prime launched a Delta One offering giving institutional clients total return swaps on U.S.-listed equities, indexes and digital assets.
Also readSEC’s New Crypto Framework Could Give Ripple a Legal Exit for XRP — But There’s a Catch
The brokerage serves more than 300 institutional clients, including hedge funds, proprietary trading firms and liquidity providers, and has incorporated its RLUSD stablecoin as eligible collateral, according to Crypto.news.
Why it matters
Leveraged ETF financing is a fee stream that has largely stayed inside large banks. A crypto-native firm winning that business shows how far institutional brokerage has moved since Ripple’s Hidden Road purchase, and it gives Ripple a revenue line that does not depend on token trading activity. The timing also puts Ripple near the leveraged crypto products approved for Cboe BZX, which need recurring financing and collateral support because they reset their exposure daily.
U.today reported that the big banks still hold the largest share of institutional financing even as Ripple’s presence in swaps, derivatives and prime brokerage grows. XRP has not been identified as part of the leveraged ETF financing arrangements, and Ripple has not disclosed how much revenue the business generates or how much of it touches XRP or the XRP Ledger.
What to watch
Ripple has not broken out revenue from this financing business, so the next signal would be any disclosure on how the Ripple Prime unit contributes to results or on the role of RLUSD and the XRP Ledger in post-trade activity. Growth in the number of leveraged ETFs in the U.S. remains the backdrop that determines how much room the business has to expand.
Nothing here is financial advice, and crypto and leveraged fund markets are volatile and uncertain.
Sources: Coinpedia, Crypto.news, U.today
