In a panel discussion, Infanger emphasized a simple yet critical barrier: trust at scale. Despite the proven effectiveness of blockchain-based settlement systems in pilot projects and specific corridors, financial institutions remain cautious about transferring over $1 billion to an infrastructure that must operate flawlessly under global financial pressures.
“We sometimes hear that the old systems work well,” Infanger pointed out, reflecting a common sentiment in traditional finance. Although the legacy infrastructure is inefficient, it is still trusted, heavily regulated, and deeply embedded in global financial operations, making transformation slow and difficult.
While banks have modernized customer-facing tools, the core settlement infrastructure still operates on pre-internet era systems. Infanger noted that despite the digital interfaces appearing sleek, the underlying infrastructure remains slow, costly, and fragmented. He estimates that between $30 trillion and $50 trillion is locked in the global financial system each year due to credit risk controls, settlement delays, and liquidity buffers. These structural inefficiencies are not just technical frictions but also embedded costs of the system's operation itself.
Against this backdrop, Ripple's long-term vision becomes increasingly clear. The XRP Ledger is positioned as the next-generation settlement layer aimed at achieving near-instant, low-cost cross-border payments. Wellm Markus Infanger's remarks highlight a deeper barrier: true scalability relies not only on transaction speed and cost but also on institutional trust in the system under significant transaction volumes and stringent regulatory pressures.
Ripple does not aim to completely replace traditional networks like SWIFT but is increasingly focused on interoperability. The company appears to be building a bridge between traditional financial infrastructure and blockchain-based payment systems, integrating rather than fully disrupting. This reflects a broader industry shift. The future of global payments does not seem to be a complete overhaul but rather an incremental fusion, where blockchain enhances existing systems that already handle trillions in daily flows. A simple conclusion from the discussion in Paris is that blockchain payment systems like Ripple are preparing for the future, but institutional trust remains a key limiting factor.