Ripple's biggest risk is regulation

Ripple Senior Vice President of Product Ashish Birla said the biggest risk the company faces today is regulation. In this regard, Ripple has assembled a large team of lawyers specializing in regulatory issues, which will ensure that the company's acquisition of new clients is not hampered by ill-conceived executive decisions.

“We've gone international and we want to make sure that for the next thousand large clients that we want to attract over the next two years, regulation is not an issue,” Birla said during a panel discussion “Scaling and Digital Disruption in Fintech,” organized by the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania.

The regulatory uncertainty that Ripple now faces is whether to to classify XRP as a securityor not. Although the US Securities and Exchange Commission has ruled that Ethereum and Bitcoin are not securities, no such ruling has been made regarding XRP. However, last month, Ripple Labs CEO Brad Garlinghouse told CCN:

“Obviously, XRP is not a security. XRP exists independently of Ripple and will exist even if Ripple Labs goes bankrupt. Just because we own XRP doesn't mean we control it. Saudi Arabia owns a lot of oil, that doesn’t mean it controls all the oil.” Birla also noted at the panel that the reason most countries around the world have taken a conservative approach to cryptocurrencies is because the sector is relatively new. And while he acknowledged that cryptocurrencies have transformative potential, Ripple is more about "shuffling the world order" rather than breaking up banks. 

Brila also noted that Ripple's technology will help smaller financial institutions compete more successfully with larger ones.

Because small fintech startups, such as Ripple once, cannot immediately offer competitive salaries, it is more difficult for them to attract talent. However, the situation is much better now than it was five years ago, when blockchain and cryptocurrencies were not so popular. Consequently, Ripple can now afford first-class specialists and is of interest to well-known technology giants in Silicon Valley.

According to ccn.com