Ripple Picks Up an Australian License by Buying the Company That Holds It
Ripple announced on March 11 that it plans to acquire BC Payments Australia Pty Ltd, a company that already holds an Australian Financial Services License (AFSL). Rather than applying for a license from scratch, a process that can take years in Australia's regulatory queue, Ripple is taking the faster route: buying an entity that already has one.
The deal, which is still pending completion, would give Ripple the ability to offer a full payments stack in Australia, including onboarding, compliance, funding, foreign exchange, liquidity management, and payout services through a single integration. The acquisition expands Ripple's regulated footprint to more than 75 licenses worldwide, according to the CoinDesk report.
XRP was trading at $1.39 as of March 11, 2026, down 0.07% over 24 hours, with a market cap of $84.8 billion.
Why Australia, Why Now
Fiona Murray, Ripple's Managing Director for Asia Pacific, framed the move as a scaling play: "Australia is a key market for Ripple, and an AFSL strengthens our ability to scale Ripple Payments across the region."
The timing lines up with a broader trend. Ripple's Asia-Pacific payments volume nearly doubled year-over-year in 2025, though the company did not disclose specific figures. Across all markets, Ripple has processed $100 billion in total volume across 60 markets. Australia sits at the intersection of two things Ripple needs: a sophisticated financial system with clear regulatory pathways and geographic proximity to the fast-growing Southeast Asian corridor.
Ripple already counts several Australian firms as customers, including Hai Ha Money Transfer, Stables, Caleb & Brown, Flash Payments, and Independent Reserve. The AFSL would let Ripple serve these clients, and new ones, under its own regulated entity rather than through partnerships.
The Acquire-the-License Playbook
Ripple's approach, buying a licensed entity instead of applying directly, is becoming a pattern across the crypto industry. Kraken secured a Federal Reserve master account. Coinbase has accumulated state money transmitter licenses for years. But the acquisition route is faster and increasingly popular in jurisdictions where application backlogs stretch past 18 months.
Australia's AFSL framework is demanding. Applicants must demonstrate organizational competence, adequate financial resources, and compliance infrastructure. By acquiring BC Payments Australia, Ripple inherits a license that has already cleared those hurdles. The trade-off is cost. Licensed entities in regulated markets command premium acquisition prices precisely because the license itself is the scarce asset.
This strategy also signals where Ripple sees the regulatory wind blowing. Rather than waiting for Australia to build a crypto-specific framework, Ripple is fitting itself into the existing financial services architecture. That is a different bet than companies lobbying for new rules. It is a bet that the current rules are good enough if you are willing to operate within them.
Project Acacia and the Reserve Bank Connection
Ripple is not just entering Australia as a payments company. It is participating in Project Acacia, a digital asset infrastructure initiative led by the Reserve Bank of Australia and the Digital Finance Cooperative Research Centre. The project explores how tokenized assets and blockchain-based settlement can integrate with Australia's existing financial plumbing.
This positions Ripple closer to Australia's central bank than most crypto firms get in any jurisdiction. Project Acacia is not a sandbox or a pilot. It is a research collaboration that could shape how Australia's payment rails evolve over the next decade. Having a seat at that table while simultaneously holding an AFSL gives Ripple both operational permission and policy influence.
What This Means for Cross-Border Payments in APAC
The Asia-Pacific region handles some of the highest remittance volumes in the world. The Philippines, India, Vietnam, and Indonesia are among the top remittance-receiving countries globally. Australia, with its large diaspora populations from these countries, is a natural hub for outbound cross-border payments.
Ripple's full payments stack, now deployable under its own Australian license, targets exactly this corridor. A business or fintech in Australia can integrate once with Ripple and access funding, FX conversion, and payout services without stitching together three or four separate providers.
For crypto card users, the implications are indirect but real. As cross-border payment infrastructure improves through companies like Ripple, the cost of moving money between fiat and crypto rails drops. Cards that offer zero FX markup already benefit from competitive wholesale rates. More competition in the underlying payment corridors pushes those rates lower for everyone.
The doubling of APAC volume also reflects a broader shift. Asia-Pacific is no longer a secondary market for crypto payments. It is where the growth is. Ripple's 75+ license count, with the AFSL as the latest addition, maps closely to the regions where stablecoin and crypto payment adoption are accelerating fastest.
75 Licenses and Counting
The sheer number of licenses Ripple now holds tells its own story. Seventy-five regulated market approvals is not something a company accumulates by accident. Each license required capital, compliance staff, local legal counsel, and ongoing reporting obligations. The operational cost of maintaining that portfolio is substantial.
But the payoff is a moat. A competitor trying to replicate Ripple's global reach would need to spend years and tens of millions of dollars acquiring similar coverage. This is the regulatory equivalent of building network effects. Each new license makes the next customer integration easier because the compliance infrastructure already exists in that jurisdiction.
Ripple's approach contrasts with companies that chase a single high-profile license (a BitLicense, an MPI in Singapore) and call it a day. The breadth-first strategy is more expensive upfront but creates a payments network that works across borders, which is the entire point of what Ripple is building.
Overview
Ripple is acquiring BC Payments Australia to obtain an Australian Financial Services License, choosing the buy-the-license-holder route over a multi-year direct application. The move expands Ripple's regulated footprint past 75 licenses globally and comes as its Asia-Pacific payments volume doubled year-over-year. Ripple is also embedded in Project Acacia, a Reserve Bank of Australia initiative exploring digital asset infrastructure. XRP trades at $1.39 with a market cap of $84.8 billion as of March 11, 2026.
