Rise of Bitcoin Competitor Ripple Creates Wealth to Rival Zuckerberg
Stellar has risen even faster than Ripple in recent weeks, with all outstanding Stellar tokens — known
as Lumens — worth around $14 billion on Thursday, making it the seventh largest virtual currency.
Nearly 40 virtual currencies are worth more than $1 billion — when all the outstanding tokens are counted at their current
value — despite many of them not having been used in any sort of transaction other than speculative trading.
Yet the fortunes of Mr. McCaleb and Mr. Larsen are not nearly as durable as those of other people on the Forbes list given
that the value of virtual currencies fluctuates wildly.
If Mr. Larsen wanted to access his wealth by selling Ripple tokens for dollars,
it would likely drive down the value of Ripple tokens — and his riches.
Several virtual currency hedge fund investors said that they have talked to banks and heard about interest in Ripple’s software, but not its tokens.
Most of the buying and selling of Ripple tokens is happening in South Korea, according to data providers
that track virtual currency exchanges, where ordinary investors have thrown money at a wide array of virtual currencies.
