Ripple Prime Delta One is now live, giving hedge funds, asset managers and other institutional counterparties synthetic exposure to US-listed equities, indexes and digital assets through total return swaps, with cross-margin capability across all three asset classes around the clock.
The service uses a single-counterparty structure, meaning clients can net margin across positions in equities, crypto and other instruments without routing through multiple prime brokers. For institutions already using Ripple Prime for FX, fixed income and digital asset clearing, it extends the existing credit relationship rather than requiring a new one.
What the Ripple Prime Delta One service actually offers
Total return swaps let a client receive the full economic return of an underlying asset (price appreciation plus income) without holding it on balance sheet. The counterparty takes the other side and charges a financing spread. Delta One desks at traditional prime brokers have run this model for years; Ripple Prime is now offering it with digital assets included in the collateral and margin framework.
That cross-asset margining is the structural differentiator. Ripple’s original rationale for acquiring Hidden Road was partly to position RLUSD (Ripple USD) as collateral across prime brokerage products, aiming to make it the first stablecoin used for efficient cross-margining between digital assets and traditional markets. The Delta One launch extends that logic into equity derivatives.
Ripple Prime President Noel Kimmel said: ‘The launch of our Delta One business is an important development for Ripple Prime and a natural extension of the platform we’ve built.’
Scale Ripple Prime has built since the Hidden Road acquisition
Ripple completed the $1.25 billion acquisition of Hidden Road in October 2025 and rebranded the business as Ripple Prime. At the time of the deal’s announcement in April 2025, CNBC reported that Hidden Road cleared more than $3 trillion annually across markets and served over 300 institutional clients, including hedge funds.
The buildout since then has been fast. According to Markets Media, citing a Kroll report, the fixed income repo platform launched in March 2025 scaled to approximately $38 billion of gross notional within its first year. FCM (futures commission merchant) segregated balances went from effectively zero in 2023 to $766 million at year-end 2025. Revenue has tripled year over year since the acquisition and rebranding, according to CoinDesk.
Ripple Prime now holds more than $1 billion in regulatory net capital. It is registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as a broker-dealer and with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) as a futures commission merchant, and is a member of FINRA, SIPC, CME Group exchanges and the FICC government securities division.
In November 2025, Ripple Prime added digital asset spot prime brokerage capabilities for US-based institutions, covering OTC spot transactions across dozens of digital assets, according to Markets Media.
Three financing rounds in 2026 backing the expansion
Ripple Prime has raised capital through three separate transactions this year. In May, it secured a $200 million debt facility from funds managed by Neuberger Specialty Finance to expand institutional lending capacity. That same month, CoinDesk reported a separate $200 million equity raise at a $40 billion valuation to support Ripple Prime’s growth.
In August, Ripple Prime closed a $275 million private placement of senior unsecured notes. According to the company’s press release, KBRA (Kroll Bond Rating Agency) assigned the notes an investment-grade rating of BBB, consistent with the investment-grade issuer rating KBRA had previously assigned to Ripple Prime. Piper Sandler acted as lead placement agent.
The combination of an investment-grade debt rating, a tripling revenue trajectory and a repo book already at $38 billion gross notional gives Ripple Prime a balance-sheet profile that starts to look comparable with mid-tier traditional prime brokers. The Delta One rollout is the next test: whether institutions will consolidate equity derivatives clearing with a crypto-native counterparty, or whether they treat it as a niche add-on. Flows into the cross-margin product over the next two quarters will be the cleaner signal.
