Ripple partners with the hottest DeFi protocol in town, but XRP plunges to $1.50

Ripple (CRYPTO:XRP) integrated Hyperliquid (CRYPTO: HYPE) in Ripple Prime, its premier institutional brokerage platform, marking the first time the company has directly supported a decentralized finance venue.

The first DeFi integration

The integration allows Ripple Prime clients to access Hyperliquid’s on-chain derivatives markets while managing these positions alongside traditional markets like FX and fixed income, a press release announced Wednesday.

Ripple Prime acts as a single counterparty, located between clients and the underlying trading platforms.

Institutions can manage their positions across multiple platforms within a single risk and margin framework instead of treating each platform separately.

Michael Higgins, Ripple Prime’s global CEO said the move improves customers’ access to liquidity with greater efficiency.

The explosive growth of hyperliquids

Hyperliquid has become the largest decentralized perpetual contracts exchange, surpassing $5 billion in open interest and $200 billion in monthly trading volume as of mid-January.

The platform recently expanded into tokenized products including silver futures, which helped the HYPE token outperform during the recent crypto selloff.

Hyperliquid is also eyeing prediction markets as its next product category.

The Ripple Prime platform

Ripple Prime was created following Ripple’s $1.25 billion acquisition of Hidden road in April 2025, completed in October 2025.

The platform serves more than 300 institutional clients and clears more than $3 trillion annually.

Since the acquisition was announced, business has tripled.

Services include clearing, prime brokerage and financing across multiple asset classes, with XRP and Ripple’s. RLUSD (CRYPTO: RLUSD) stablecoin integrated into all offers.

HYPE Price Action