Matt Hamilton Archives - Times Tabloid

Former Ripple Director Says Ripple Can Burn All XRP in Escrow

Adedoyin Aka — Fri, 22 Dec 2023 00:33:38 +0000

Former Ripple Director Matt Hamilton has recently suggested that the payment firm might possess the technical capability to burn all XRP locked in its escrow wallets.

This bold claim, if true, adds a new layer of complexity to Ripple’s ongoing legal battle with the SEC, sparking discussions about the company’s intentions for the controversial digital asset.

Hamilton, a respected figure in the XRP ecosystem, contends that Ripple’s technical expertise enables it to render the escrowed funds virtually untouchable. By disabling the master key for the designated accounts, Ripple could effectively “burn” the whopping XRP, making it permanently inaccessible.

This notion introduces a novel dynamic to the ongoing legal saga, potentially granting Ripple significant leverage in its fight.

The concept of burning XRP tokens gained traction recently after the SEC, in a separate case, requested the destruction of LBRY Credits (LBC) tokens. This triggered a heated debate within the XRP community, with many wondering if Ripple could be forced to burn its own escrowed tokens.

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Pro-XRP Lawyer: Burning Requires Due Process

Bill Morgan, a prominent XRP advocate and lawyer, further clarified the legal intricacies involved. He argues that a court order to burn XRP wouldn’t automatically bind XRPL validators, necessitating a legal hearing to enforce such action.

This aligns with Garlinghouse’s earlier stance, suggesting that burning tokens would be a carefully considered decision, undertaken only under specific circumstances for the ecosystem’s benefit.

A New Chapter Could Unfold

As Ripple navigates the legal labyrinth, the potential of token burning hangs heavy in the air. This audacious possibility, while technically feasible and strategically intriguing, raises a multitude of questions about the future of XRP.

Will Ripple wield this digital firebomb, or will it remain a last-ditch gambit kept in reserve? Only time will tell, but one thing is certain: this revelation has added a dramatic twist to the already captivating Ripple vs. SEC saga, ensuring that the future of XRP remains shrouded in an aura of uncertainty.

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Top Ripple Executives Engage in Heated Conversation Over XRP Tax Implications: Details

Adedoyin Aka — Sun, 30 Jul 2023 16:23:45 +0000

A contentious discussion has recently ignited within the cryptocurrency community, with several influential figures in the XRP community engaging in a debate over the tax implications associated with utilizing XRP for cross-currency payments. The focus of the conversation centers around XRPL pathfinding and its potential impact on taxable events.

Exploring Taxable Events in XRP Settlements

Fredo Ayala, a respected accounting and finance consultant with a deep interest in digital assets, kick-started the thought-provoking dialogue. Ayala put forth the notion that if an XRP settlement occurs seamlessly within a single ledger without any price fluctuations, the taxable implications would solely apply to the customer involved.

However, he further elaborated that if price shifts were to occur during the pathfinding process, both the increase and decrease in taxable events could arise.

#XRPL Pathfinding causes taxable events in the US.

If it settles in a single ledger and prices do not change between buying and selling then the implications are only for the customer.

If they shift while pathing then we got -/+

Europe sees crypto was gambling so this…

— Fredo Ayala (@Fayala_brash) July 29, 2023

Ripple Execs: Delving into the Nuances of Cross-Currency Payments

Neil Hartner, a senior staff software engineer at Ripple, sought to gain clarity on a specific scenario involving a cross-currency payment from USD to EUR, auto-bridged through USD to XRP, and subsequently XRP to EUR.

Neil Hartner noted, “So a USD to EUR cross-currency payment creates a taxable event if autobridged using USD to XRP + XRP to EUR?”

Ayala responded affirmatively, confirming that such a complex transaction would indeed trigger a taxable event, dependent on any gains or losses compared to the cost basis at the time of purchase.

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Adding an interesting perspective to the conversation, Matt Hamilton, a former director of developer relations at Ripple, drew a parallel between XRPL and traditional banking methods. Hamilton pointed out that banks, being established legal entities, are already responsible for reporting gains and losses.

Matt Hamilton wrote, “What about if I send GBP to BBD in a non-blockchain world? And a correspondent bank converts to USD in the middle. How is that any different?”

On the other hand, the decentralized exchange within XRPL lacks any reporting obligations. Consequently, the onus of handling tax-related matters falls directly on the party initiating the transaction.

In response to Hilmilton’s concern, David Schwartz, the CTO at Ripple and key architect behind XRP Ledger (XRPL), emphasized that the taxability of gains and profits remains independent of who reports them.

Schwartz argued that any profits or gains generated during the process should be considered taxable income for the party responsible, irrespective of whether they are reported or not.

David Schwartz said “I don’t see why the internals of the payment would make any difference. If the value of what comes out exceeds your basis in what went in, you have a taxable gain. I don’t think what’s in the middle makes any difference.”

By engaging in this stimulating debate, Ripple’s top executives aim to shed light on the intricacies surrounding the taxation of XRP transactions.

As regulatory frameworks continue to evolve, it is crucial for both individuals and businesses involved in the cryptocurrency space to stay informed about the potential tax implications associated with their activities.

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Ex-Ripple Exec Says About 48 Billion XRP Held By Ripple Has No Impact on XRP Price, States Major Factors

Adedoyin Aka — Mon, 17 Jul 2023 06:44:42 +0000

In a recent Twitter exchange, former Director of Developer Relations at Ripple Matt Hamilton refuted the claim that the cross-border payments firm’s XRP holdings have a significant impact on the price of the token.

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Hamilton pointed out that Ripple is indeed the largest holder of XRP, possessing approximately 48 billion tokens. However, he highlighted that the majority of these holdings are kept in escrow contracts. These contracts release a portion of the XRP monthly, with Ripple only selling a small fraction and reinvesting the remainder into new escrow contracts.

As a result, Hamilton argued that Ripple’s influence on the market is relatively limited considering the global daily sales volume of XRP, which stands at around 4 billion tokens. In other words, the vast majority of XRP trading volume is not related to Ripple’s sales.

As for influencing price, the totally daily sales volume globally of XRP is about 4B XRP, so Ripple’s holdings are pretty small in comparison. The price of XRP mostly follows the test of the market and mostly follows BTC.

— Matt Hamilton (@HammerToe) July 16, 2023

Market Forces and Bitcoin (BTC) Drive Price

The developer then shed light on the underlying dynamics that really drive the price of XRP. He emphasized that market forces and the performance of Bitcoin (BTC) largely dictate XRP’s price movements.

In particular, Hamilton noted that XRP tends to follow the price of BTC, with both tokens rising and falling together. This is likely due to the fact that many investors view XRP as a “gateway” to the wider cryptocurrency market.

Community Can Burn XRP

Furthermore, Hamilton clarified that neither XRP nor XRPL is under Ripple’s control. To emphasize this point, he suggested that if the community deemed it necessary, all of Ripple’s holdings in XRP could be burned. This would effectively remove the company from the XRP ecosystem and give the community complete control over the token.

In response to concerns about Ripple’s significant ownership of the token, Hamilton reassured that this should not be seen as a worrying factor for the future. He explained that since Ripple operates just one validator, the community holds the power to vote for an amendment that would effectively “burn” the company’s holdings if they acted against the community’s interests.

In conclusion, Hamilton’s insights provide a valuable perspective on the relationship between Ripple’s holdings and the price of XRP. According to the developer, while the company is the largest holder of the token, its influence on the market is relatively limited. The real drivers of XRP’s price are market forces and the performance of BTC. Additionally, the community has the power to burn Ripple’s holdings if they act against the community’s interests.

Additional Thoughts

Hamilton’s comments are likely to be welcomed by XRP holders who are concerned about the company’s influence on the price of the token.
The fact that the community has the power to burn Ripple’s holdings is a significant safeguard against the company abusing its position as the largest holder of XRP.
It will be interesting to see how the price of XRP responds to Hamilton’s comments in the coming weeks and months.

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Ripple CTO David Schwartz Shares Thought On Ongoing XRP Burn Debate – Details

Chinedu Agbakwusi — Wed, 17 May 2023 08:27:52 +0000

Ripple’s Chief Technology Officer (CTO), David Schwartz, just disclosed the level of decentralization on the XRP Ledger (XRPL), especially its connection with terms of governance voting.

While speaking about nodes on XRP, David maintained that nodes on the XRPL have the exclusive right to take or reject amendments voted to be enforced by validators with the escrowed XRP, especially the escrowed XRP in Ripple’s possession.

Matt Hamilton’s Revelation

Matt Hamilton, a one-time Ripple director, previously hinted that Ripple could decide to burn all the escrowed XRP tokens. Hamilton’s revelation linked to some of Schwartz’s comments in December 2020. Schwartz noted that about 80% of most validators on the XPRL could vote to have the XRP on Ripple’s escrow accounts burned.

XRP Community Members’ Concerns

Following Matt’s revelation, an XRP community member claimed that XRPL would likely be a permissioned platform if validators on the network are powerful enough to decide what becomes of the XRP in escrow, making the platform more centralized than a decentralized firm.

Ripple CTO Joins the Conversation

While addressing significant concerns raised by most XRP community members, Hamilton tried to clarify his statements on validators and voting. Matt ascertained that validators have the choice to vote to amend supply.

Elucidating further, Schwartz said that if validators should vote for the amendment, the amendments will get implemented like a code. Finally, nodes can decide whether to run the updated code or not. Schwartz said, “Every node operator would have to make an active choice to accept the rules change.”

Schwartz hammered why validators lack the power to coerce node operators into running the code that contains the amendment. “Validators cannot force nodes to accept rules changes because rules are enforced by the code each node chooses to run. If you don’t agree with a validator, it just counts against the 80% threshold,” he said.

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Former Ripple Executive Believes XRP Can Hit $100 in the Long Run. Here’s His Major Point

Tobi Loba — Mon, 06 Jun 2022 12:19:32 +0000

Matt Hamilton, former director of developer relations at Ripple, has showcased his faith in the future prospect of XRP, the digital token designed for cross-border payments. In a thread of tweets on 5th May, he said he does not “see why XRP couldn’t hit $100 at some point.”

XRP is a popular cryptocurrency that was the third-largest in the market before December 2020, when Ripple, the major distributor of the digital currency, was sued by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for allegedly selling the digital token as an unregistered security.

The effect of the lawsuit was immediately seen on the price trend of XRP. The SEC hammer obviously deterred XRP from joining the bull market that pushed Bitcoin (BTC) beyond $60,000 resistance level around that time. However, XRP started regaining its lost surging momentum after some positive outcomes from the lawsuit.

Now, the XRP community anticipates victory in the lawsuit or a favorable settlement between Ripple and the SEC, which will obviously take the value of the digital token to the next level.

Matt Hamilton Believes XRP Could Hit $100. Here’s why

The conversation was started on the 5th of June by Max Walker-Williams, an analyst and YouTube content creator.

Captioning a video about Ripple and XRP, Max Walker-Williams tweeted, “Another day, another @YouTube video this time, what you might not know about @Ripple and why XRP could go to $100. Coming very soon…”

Max Walker-Williams’s opinion was then opposed by a supposed Bitcoin enthusiast who tagged the post as a scam. In a nutshell, he blatantly tagged XRP as a scam coin. This prompted Matt Hamilton to weigh in.

The Bitcoin enthusiast wrote, “Xrp is a scam. You know this. Suggesting it could hit $100 is ludicrous. It’s overvalued by 99% (I’m being kind) at the current valuation.”

The user claimed further that Max Walker-Williams is suggesting that XRP could rise up to $5 trillion market cap, which is more than double Apple’s market capitalization. He wrote, “This is ludicrous. Xrp is literally a worthless entry on a centralised database. By releasing a video that suggests this you are promoting a scam.”

In response to the Bitcoin enthusiast’s claims about XRP being centralized, Matt Hamilton wrote, “Centralised database? OK, so future valuations are very much subjective, and no-one has a crystal ball. But pretending you don’t know the difference between a blockchain and a centralised database is not going to help your assessment of things. The XRP Ledger is decentralised.”

Centralised database? OK, so future valuations are very much subjective, and no-one has a crystal ball. But pretending you don't know the difference between a blockchain and a centralised database is not going to help your assessment of things. The XRP Ledger is decentralised.

— Matt Hamilton (@HammerToe) June 5, 2022

In another tweet, the Bitcoin enthusiast asked the former Ripple executive if he believes that XRP could reach $100 in the long run. In response, he said he doesn’t see why XRP can’t reach $100, since Bitcoin was once priced at relatively $0 back in 2009.

Matt Hamilton wrote, “I don’t make price predictions. But I don’t see why XRP couldn’t hit $100 at some point. Just question of time. If you said in 2009 that Bitcoin would hit $60k, you’d be laughed.”

What makes you think the XRP Ledger is a centralised database? You know how blockchains work, right?

I don’t make price predictions. But I don’t see why XRP couldn’t hit $100 at some point. Just question of time. If you said in 2009 that Bitcoin would hit $60k, you’d be laughed

— Matt Hamilton (@HammerToe) June 5, 2022

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Ripple’s Top Developer Just Left. Here’s why

Solomon Odunayo — Thu, 17 Mar 2022 08:24:31 +0000

Matt Hamilton, the director of developer relations at Ripple, has recently announced his departure from the San Francisco-based payment firm.

In a recent blog post, Hamilton says that 2021 was a tough year for him personally due to his wife’s mental health issues. He said he left the payment firm to focus on his family after realizing that he’s been dealing with too many things at once.

Matt Hamilton noted:

“Ripple has been amazingly supportive through all this time, both on a personal and a professional level. However, despite all the support, it has become clear I am spinning too many plates.

“So I’m going to be stepping down from my role at Ripple to focus on supporting my family and helping my wife recover. This is a hard decision to make, but something I feel is necessary. Don’t worry, I’ll still be involved in the XRP Ledger community, albeit maybe to a lesser degree for a while.”

Hamilton, who had worked for tech giants such as Hewlett-Packard (HP) and IBM, joined Ripple in January 2021 to work for the expansion of XRP ecosystem.

During his short-lived stay at Ripple, he contributed to the launch of XRP Ledger Grants program, hosted the RippleXDev channels on Twitch and Discord, and organized XRPL Hackathons. He also represented Ripple at various tech conferences and other events.

In conclusion, Hamilton said, “I’ve no doubt missed people and events off that list. Every time I’ve looked back at it, I’ve remembered other cool things I’ve had a chance to be a part of and people I’ve worked with – It has been an amazing year. A big thanks to the Ripple Leadership team, especially Monica Long for her leadership of the RippleX business unit.”

Ripple Plans 1 Billion XRP Giveaway to Developers

According to the recent report by The Information, Ripple, the cross-border payment firm, plans to give away 1 billion XRP tokens to developers over the next decades.

Going by the report, the program aims to incentivize the creation of new projects within the XRP ecosystem.

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