Everyone knows the legend of Bitcoin: Satoshi Nakamoto, 2008 whitepaper, and the first block mined in early 2009.
But what if the idea of moving money without banks had actually been kicking around years earlier? According to recently resurfaced emails from 2014, that might just be the case — and the project in question? Ripple.
2004 Emails Suggest Ripple’s Seeds Were Planted Years Before Bitcoin
A set of old emails, now circulating in the XRP community thanks to crypto user SMOQE, reveal that the concept for Ripple may have started as early as 2004.
That’s four years before Bitcoin was even a glimmer in Satoshi’s eye.
The emails include commentary from tech writer Reutzel Bailey and crypto veteran Jeffrey Cliff, both of whom reflect on Ryan Fugger’s early payment network, RipplePay.
According to Bailey, RipplePay was never intended to be a cryptocurrency in the modern sense — more of a digital IOU system that cut out banks.
RipplePay Was All About Trust, Not Mining
Back in 2004, Fugger’s project allowed people to transfer value between trusted individuals, without relying on banks.
It was a system based on digital trust relationships, not mining or public consensus.
It was private, fast, and far removed from the decentralized mining model that defines Bitcoin today.
But that early foundation is what eventually gave rise to Ripple as we now know it.
Enter Bitcoin, and the Vision Evolves
According to the email thread, it wasn’t until Bitcoin gained momentum that Chris Larsen stepped in and helped shift Ripple’s direction toward crypto.
While some might call Ripple a “Bitcoin copycat,” Jeffrey Cliff pushed back against that idea.
He argued Ripple wasn’t trying to mimic Bitcoin’s math-based model, but rather evolve a different kind of digital value transfer system—one that came first in concept.
The XRP Ledger Took Shape in 2012
In 2011, Ripple’s development took a major leap forward when Jed McCaleb, Arthur Britto, and David Schwartz started working on a new version of the Ripple protocol—something that would eventually become the XRP Ledger.
Their big idea? Ditch Bitcoin’s energy-hungry proof-of-work system and build something leaner, faster, and still secure.
The following year, the token XRP officially went live.
A Timeline of Name Changes and Major Milestones
Ripple’s evolution wasn’t just technical—it came with a few name changes too.
Originally dubbed NewCoin, the project became OpenCoin in 2013, and eventually settled on the name Ripple in 2015.
For context, by the time XRP launched in 2012, Netflix had just crossed 1 million U.S. subscribers—and McCaleb would continue selling off his XRP holdings until 2022, years after leaving Ripple to co-found Stellar.
Founders Received Huge Token Allocations—And Took Different Paths
When XRP was launched, the founders gave a whopping 80 billion tokens to the company.
McCaleb walked away with 9.5 billion XRP, which he agreed to sell slowly over time to avoid market chaos.
By 2022, he had fully exited his XRP position.
Larsen, meanwhile, stayed with the company and now serves as Ripple’s chairman.
Bitcoin May Have Been First to Launch, But Ripple Came First in Spirit
Bitcoin might still hold the crown as the first cryptocurrency to go live and shake up the financial world.
But if these early emails are anything to go by, Ripple was already dreaming of a world without banks long before Bitcoin became a thing.
This revelation adds an intriguing layer to crypto history—and challenges the idea that Bitcoin was the only spark that lit the decentralized fire.
Final Thought: Crypto’s Origin Story May Be More Complicated Than We Thought
It’s easy to think of Bitcoin as the lone pioneer, but Ripple’s backstory shows that digital finance innovation didn’t start with Satoshi Nakamoto.
From Ryan Fugger’s digital trust network in 2004 to today’s high-speed XRP Ledger, it’s clear that the vision of money without middlemen has more than one origin story.
