SWIFT CIO questions Ripple and XRP’s readiness for global banking standards

Zschach questions whether banks will accept XRP's "external token" for settlement over existing trusted instruments.

Cover art/illustration via CryptoSlate. Image includes combined content which may include AI-generated content.

SWIFT’s Chief Innovation Officer, Tom Zschach, has raised doubts about whether Ripple’s technology and the XRP token can meet the standards global banks demand for cross-border settlement.

His remarks, posted on LinkedIn, sparked renewed debate within the XRP community, which has long positioned Ripple as a challenger to SWIFT’s dominance.

Zschach said some observers view XRP as a natural bridge for payments, but he questioned whether banks will ever be comfortable outsourcing settlement finality to an external token.

According to him:

“The harder question is whether banks will ever be comfortable outsourcing settlement finality to a token that isn’t a deposit, isn’t regulated money and doesn’t sit on their balance sheet. Liquidity is one thing; legal enforceability is another.”

He added that if tokenized deposits and regulated stablecoins achieve scale, banks may see little reason to pay a “toll” to an external asset like XRP when they can settle in instruments they already issue and trust.

Public blockchains

In a separate post, Zschach expanded on the broader role of blockchains in finance. He argued that the debate over decentralization often distracts from the real issue of whether a system aligns with institutional risk management.

He wrote:

“Neutrality in finance isn’t about how many nodes you run, it’s about whether the network privileges one participant over another.”

Zschach compared open blockchains to a “fast engine with no cockpit,” noting that they remain incomplete for institutional use without legal frameworks, privacy safeguards, and regulatory oversight.

For Zschach, the missing “trust layer” explains why banks continue to rely on SWIFT. The cooperative does not issue its assets, compete with its members, or tilt economics in favor of any institution.

He wrote:

“Blockchains like Ethereum are absolutely part of the solution but neutrality in markets also requires governance, regulation and enforceability. Code and validators alone don’t resolve billion-dollar disputes. Swift has been doing that for decades, which is why institutions continue to rely on it and why blockchains will complement, not replace, that role.”

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