Ripple and Stellar: The Tale of Two Networks Born from the Same Code
Stellar and Ripple share a common origin story, dating back to their founding by Jed McCaleb and his team in 2012. The two networks were initially built on the same codebase, but they diverged significantly after McCaleb left Ripple in 2013.
McCaleb's departure was reportedly due to disagreements over Ripple's direction and control of the XRP Ledger. He wanted a network focused on financial inclusion, while Ripple was becoming a for-profit company selling settlement software to banks. This led to the creation of Stellar as a nonprofit alternative, built on a forked version of Ripple's code.
The two networks have since developed distinct tokenomics and governance models. Ripple locked 55 billion XRP into escrow contracts in December 2017, releasing up to 1 billion XRP each month, while Stellar burned half its supply outright in November 2019, cutting total supply from 105 billion to roughly 50 billion.
The question of decentralization remains a topic of debate for both networks. While Ripple claims to operate fewer than 10% of validators and only one appears on the default list, Stellar's SCP is often described as more open due to its distributed trust decisions. However, critics argue that both networks' validator sets remain permissioned or shaped by a foundation-published list.