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Standard Chartered Will Hold Ripple's Stablecoin in Dubai—And Let Clients Trade With It Without Moving It
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Standard Chartered’s Dubai International Financial Centre branch has begun offering institutional custody for Ripple USD, or RLUSD, issued on the XRP Ledger. The British bank announced the service Monday. It is available to eligible clients through a branch regulated by the Dubai Financial Services Authority.
The move gives institutions a regulated place to hold RLUSD, a stablecoin designed to maintain a $1 value. Ripple launched RLUSD in December 2024 on Ethereum and the XRP Ledger. Standard Chartered’s custody covers the XRP Ledger version.
Custody is financial plumbing: a regulated institution safeguards assets and bears legal responsibility. It can also supervise, freeze, or control funds while held. For crypto clients, that arrangement may be more important than yield.
Standard Chartered also joined a planned integration with LMAX Group, a London-based currency and crypto marketplace. The plan would make RLUSD eligible collateral on agreed LMAX products. Under collateral mirroring, tokens stay at the bank while LMAX receives a mirrored record of their value. The coins never travel to the exchange.
That structure could protect traders if an exchange fails. Their collateral would remain at Standard Chartered, one of 29 banks the Financial Stability Board considers too big to fail. Such banks face tougher capital rules.
RLUSD has grown to roughly $2.45 billion in market cap. It remains under 1% of a stablecoin market worth about $306 billion. Dubai’s regulator approved RLUSD in June 2025. Standard Chartered has offered crypto custody in Dubai since 2024.
The LMAX leg is not live yet. The bank said it remains subject to final documentation, testing, and regulatory approvals. No date was given for when clients can post RLUSD as margin.
