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XRP can technically reach the same plumbing as FedNow, thanks to a payments infrastructure company called Volante Technologies. The Federal Reserve hasn’t endorsed XRP for anything, and the connection is about as direct as saying your car is “integrated” with NASA because they both use GPS.
Crypto researcher SMQKE spotlighted the relationship on August 23, drawing attention to the fact that Volante, which processes transactions for seven of the top ten US banks, connects institutions to both FedNow and Ripple’s network on a single platform. The implication, amplified across crypto media, is that XRP now powers FedNow payments. The truth is more interesting, and considerably less dramatic.
What Volante actually does
Volante Technologies is a cloud-based payments infrastructure provider that acts as a universal adapter for financial institutions. Think of it as a power strip that lets banks plug into multiple payment networks simultaneously: FedNow, RTP, Fedwire, SWIFT, and yes, Ripple.
The company launched its Ripple integration back in October 2015. By 2016, Volante had added a Ripple solution to its VolPay Foundation platform. And in June 2020, Volante confirmed that its platform could settle payments through XRP via its connection with Ripple.
Volante also became one of the first processors of FedNow transactions when the Federal Reserve launched the instant payment system in 2023. So now the same platform that offers XRP settlement also connects to FedNow. That’s it. That’s the integration.
A bank using Volante could, in theory, use XRP as a settlement asset while also accessing FedNow rails. These are two separate capabilities living under one roof, not a single pipeline where XRP tokens flow through Federal Reserve infrastructure.
The gap between capability and endorsement
No official Federal Reserve confirmation exists that positions XRP as a service provider for FedNow. That distinction matters enormously.
FedNow is the Fed’s own real-time gross settlement system, designed to let banks send and receive payments instantly in US dollars. It was built to modernize domestic payments, not to serve as a bridge for digital asset settlement.
Volante’s role is as a middleware provider. It gives banks a single interface to access multiple payment networks. The fact that Ripple and FedNow both appear on Volante’s menu of options doesn’t mean they’re connected to each other any more than Netflix and Hulu are connected because they both run on your smart TV.
The key word is “optional.” Banks choosing Volante get access to XRP settlement as one tool among many. Whether any of them actually use it for FedNow-adjacent workflows is a separate question entirely, and one that neither Volante nor Ripple has publicly answered with concrete transaction data.
Why this narrative keeps surfacing
The Volante connection is a legitimate technical fact that has existed for years. The Ripple integration dates back to 2015. But the crypto market has a habit of rediscovering old partnerships and repackaging them as breaking news, particularly when they can be tied to something as symbolically powerful as the Federal Reserve.
SMQKE’s post and the subsequent media coverage illustrate a familiar pattern in crypto discourse. A real but limited technical relationship gets amplified into a story about institutional adoption and government validation. The underlying facts don’t change, but the framing does.
For XRP holders, the Volante-FedNow narrative is a double-edged sword. On one side, it highlights the genuine infrastructure that exists for banks to use XRP if they choose to. Volante serving seven of the top ten US banks means the theoretical addressable market for XRP settlement is substantial. On the other side, the gap between “theoretically possible” and “actively used at scale” is enormous, and overstating XRP’s role in FedNow risks creating expectations that reality can’t support.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
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