Greenspan: XRP Not A Security But Community Still Too Aggressive
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XRP should not be classified as a security, according to Mati Greenspan, senior market analyst at eToro. That said, Greenspan says that the XRP community’s behavior has been counter-productive to adoption by the banking sector.
Asked for his views on XRP, Greenspan confirmed he is still “bullish” on the payments settlement token. In a webinar this afternoon, he said that the token could disrupt the entire banking system. He also argued that XRP should not be classified as a security in the US, and that its characteristics more closely resemble those of a utility token.
“XRP is not a security, in my personal opinion”, Greenspan said. “My best understanding is XRP is logically a utility token [but] the SEC may see things differently.”
Greenspan nonetheless expressed reservations, principally for the behavior of its online community. Although XRP’s large following has been very effective in raising awareness, it also has an aggressive side: in the fans attempting to bully banks into adopting XRP.
“The negative side to [XRP’s online community] is aggressiveness,” Greenspan said. “Floods of people are attempting to force banks to accept XRP.”
Greenspan argued that this aggressiveness may be pushing the financial institutions away. Banks that had publicly considered adopting XRP later decided against it, largely because of the unruly online community, he said. This behavior may be harming XRP’s chances of mainstream adoption .
Winning the Hashtag War
No community is quite so active as XRP’s. The self-styled “#XRPArmy” has been vocal on a number of issues, especially surrounding XRP’s regulatory status in the US. They have also demanded a listing on popular cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase.
The community’s behavior has become so overbearing that some are beginning to block them entirely. Jackson Palmer, the creator of Dogecoin (DOGE), had his own individual battles with what he described as a “toxic dumpster fire of a community.” In December, Palmer published an open source script for Twitter called ‘XRP away.’ When enabled, the script automatically blocks anyone from mentioning a user who has the term ‘XRP’ mentioned in any part of their profile.
You can find my simple script to automatically block XRP accounts that slide into your mentions @ https://t.co/h4OQV2EITa – I call it XRP Away™️ https://t.co/5H0CK1lvZq
— Jackson Palmer (@ummjackson) December 2, 2018
Palmer’s experience wasn’t unique. Daniel Floyd, writing for Coindesk, came under heavy attack from the XRP community – not in response to any article that he had written, but merely for approaching leading figures for comment.
Add it to the list
Not everyone believes XRP will be adopted by the banks. Nano’s (NANO) founder, Colin LeMahieu, told Crypto Briefing last month that it was too slow and centralized for the banks.
Greenspan shared some of the same concerns, as Ripple Labs, the token’s creator still owns nearly 60% of the total supply. This, he felt, could make it a risky asset with a high selling pressure, making the token’s value difficult to stabilize.
Greenspan is a long-term holder of XRP, having bought his first tokens back in May 2013. But as he explained, the project’s viability rests almost entirely on financial institutions. Most of these companies treasure their public image; they could be put off from joining forces with a project with an aggressive and uncontrollable online community.
Despite its sleek image, XRP has multiple problems that it needs to iron out. Attention has mostly focused on its regulatory status and use case; an unruly community might also belong on the list.
The author is invested in digital assets, but none mentioned in this article.
The title of this article has been updated to note that Mati Greenspan used the word “aggressive” and not “toxic”.
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